by Peggy Gaddis
Judy looked up at him, puzzled.
“You must have known there was one when you invited me to walk in it with you in the moonlight,” she told him.
He cupped her elbow in his palm and drew her closer to him, bending his head slightly.
“That was merely a figure of speech,” he informed her. “I would just as gladly walk with you through freshly plowed fields in a thunderstorm.”
All about them the garden lay dreaming in the moonlight, fragrant with dew. It was early, and not many of the roses were in full bloom, but the bushes were thickly starred with buds. The path that led down through the middle of the garden was bordered with fragrant narcissi and hyacinth and other spring flowers Roger could not identify, though their mingled fragrance made him sniff with delight.
Midway in the path ahead of them there was a small fountain, and at its base, where the water overflowed the bowl, were pond lilies, white and fragile against the dark water that was silvered here and there by moonlight.
“What a place!” said Roger softly, his tone touched with awe as they paused at the fountain and he looked about him.
The moonlight lay in a silver flood across the garden. Beneath the tall trees the shadows were ink-black. The house was like a vast ship floating on a bright sea. Judy looked up at Roger’s face, which was revealed in the moonlight, and said softly, “I wish Bix felt like that about Oakhill.”
“Bix is a very spoiled young man who doesn’t know what’s good for him,” Roger said firmly. “Any man with a brain in his head would realize that Oakhill is just about as close to Paradise as a fellow can get and still live. I only wish I lived here.”
“You’d probably be as bored as Bix if you had to stay here,” Judy told him.
“That’s a terrible thought, Pretty Thing—that I could be bored amid all this beauty and peace.”
Suddenly in a tree very near them, a mockingbird awoke, plagued by the moonlight, disturbed by their voices, stirred, made a soft rustling sound and then began a trill that was purest melody.
Judy laid her hand on Roger’s arm, and they listened to the song, soft and sweet and rising now and then to a crescendo of joy until at last it faded into silence.
“What price the nightingale in Berkely Square?” Roger said softly when the music had died away, and his voice was slightly shaken.
“I don’t believe it could be more beautiful, do you? The mockingbirds sing a lot at night later when the weather gets warmer. But he’s early. Maybe he’s got a lot to be happy about: a mate and a nest. Eventually there’ll be baby birds, and he’ll just about work himself to death feeding them.”
Roger looked down at her. “So he sings day and night now while he can,” he commented. “Well, hooray for him!”
“You don’t mind him singing? I mean, you were disturbed by the birds when you first arrived, remember?” Judy teased him.
“When I first arrived and shared a room with Terry, it was his snoring that kept me awake! He drinks like a fish and has practically to be poured into bed, so of course he snores,” Roger told her matter of factly. “But when you were kind enough to give me a room to myself away from him, I decided the birds were much better than alarm clocks, even if you can’t turn them off the way you do an alarm clock when you want to go back to sleep.”
Judy laughed up at him.
“I’m glad you’ve grown accustomed to the birds,” she told him. “I love them! They’re part of Oakhill and come back every year; those that ever go away, I mean. Most of them don’t, of course.”
“They’d be fools if they did,” Roger told her firmly. “Where would they ever find another place as beautiful as this where they would be welcome?”
Judy looked up at him swiftly in the silvery moonlight.
“Do you think Oakhill is beautiful?” she asked.
Puzzled by the unexpected vehemence of the question, he looked down at her, trying to read her expression, though she stood where her face was in the shadows.
“Beautiful?” he repeated as though he found the word completely inadequate. “Why, it’s an earthly Paradise. I can’t think of any place I’ve ever seen that is one half so beautiful.”
“Would you be willing to live here?” she persisted, and added, “I mean permanently?”
His puzzled expression deepened.
“That would all depend on who shared the place with me,” he answered. “What kind of a question is that?”
She turned away from him and spoke over her shoulder.
“Oakhill will belong to Bix when the Old Gentleman is gone,” she told him. “And Bix is going to sell it.”
“The devil you say!” Roger protested. “Well, of course Bix is a city slicker now. I suppose life does seem a bit dull for him here, though I imagine that disposing of a piece of property as extensive as Oakhill will be quite a job.”
She did not answer. At the moment she could not trust her voice not to shake. Roger put his hand on her shoulder and turned her about to face him.
“Look, Pretty Thing, you mustn’t let this get you down,” he urged her gently. “Sure, I know Oakhill means an awful lot to you. But after all, you’ll be getting married one of these days and going away from here, even if it isn’t sold.”
She shook her head stubbornly.
“I’d never marry anybody who couldn’t be perfectly happy living at Oakhill.”
Roger studied her for a moment—the moonlight was full on her face now—and suddenly he grinned.
“Thanks,” he said warmly.
Puzzled, she asked, “Thanks for what?”
“For making it plain that you aren’t—what’s that word that is so old-fashioned no other word fits the setting and the scenery?—betrothed!”
“I didn’t say that!”
“Of course not. But if you had someone in mind, someone you expected or wanted to marry, you’d never have said that!” He was quite smug about it. “That is, of course, unless it’s somebody who lives here at Oakhill and likes it enough to want to go on living here.”
He drew a deep breath and was thoughtful for a moment. Then he nodded.
“That, of course, would be Sam Gillespie.” His tone made it a statement, not a question.
More puzzled now than before, Judy asked, “How did Sam get into this?”
“Well, he seems to be quite a lad. He’s lived here all his life, and so have you. And since you’d make a very attractive couple, what could be more natural than that you and Sam should have plans for the future, even if Oakhill is sold?”
Judy stared at him, and then burst out laughing.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake!” she gasped. “Sam’s my big brother! I couldn’t possibly be in love with Sam! He’s my very best friend and the one I run to when a problem crops up. But that doesn’t mean I’m in love with him!”
Roger beamed at her happily, and for a moment his arm drew her close.
“Now that’s what I wanted to hear!” he told her happily. “If you’re not bespoken for, then there’s nothing to stop me from pursuing you relentlessly, is there?”
Judy freed herself from his arm, still smiling up at him, and said lightly, “Not if you don’t mind knowing from the beginning that it’s a quite hopeless pursuit.”
Roger nodded soberly. “That I do mind very much,” he admitted frankly. “But then I’m a persistent cuss. I won’t give up until I see you march down the aisle with another guy. I only hope I’ll be able to restrain myself from shooting him full of holes; one of those ‘if I can’t have her, nobody else can’ shooting scrapes we read about often.”
Judy laughed up at him as she turned toward the house and said, “Oh, somehow I can’t imagine you ever wanting something badly enough to fight for it.”
“Now that I do resent very much,” he told her swiftly. “I’m not all that wishy-washy! I admit there’s not a great deal I want badly enough to feel a fight is justified. But for a girl like you, I could be a roaring lion.”
“I’m flattered,” s
he teased him as they mounted the wide, shallow stone steps that led up from the garden to the broad verandah, its white columns glowing in the moonlight
Before he could answer that, Marise and Sam came out of the house. Marise was laughing up at Sam, her hand on his arm holding him while she finished some gay remark. Sam nodded, smiled at her, and glanced at Judy and Roger where they stood a few feet away. For a moment Sam looked straight at Judy, then at Roger, and his jaw hardened as he turned and walked to his car.
Marise watched until he had driven off. Then, when she turned to go into the house, she saw Judy and Roger and stiffened. The laughing gaiety with which she had bade Sam goodbye was gone, and her lovely face was much less lovely now.
“So there you are, Roger,” she snapped. “I’ve been wondering where you were. I might have known, of course, that if there was a pretty girl around, you’d be wherever she was.”
“Thanks,” said Judy dryly.
Marise shot her a swift, hostile glance and turned toward the house.
“Come along, Rog; we need another hand for poker. Sam chickened out on us.” She flung the words at Roger over her shoulder, as though there could not possibly be any objection to such an order.
“Smart guy, that Sam!” chuckled Roger in Judy’s ear as they walked into the house behind Marise.
He walked with Judy to the foot of the stairs and stood for a moment smiling at her. Behind him Marise appeared in the drawing room door, calling to him, “I’m waiting, Rog.”
“Presently,” said Roger over his shoulder.
Judy, facing Marise, saw a blaze of fury on the lovely face and heard the whiplash sting in Marise’s voice as she spat out, “Now, Rog! This minute!”
Roger winked at Judy, lifted his shoulders and turned to walk past Marise into the drawing room. And Marise walked to the foot of the stairs and stood looking up at Judy with that twisted, malevolent look on her face.
“Please stay away from my men,” Marise spat out furiously.
Judy added to Manse’s fury by being completely untouched by the venom. In fact, she laughed and said lightly, “Suppose you keep your men away from me. I was merely showing Roger the rose garden by moonlight. It’s quite a sight.”
“Rose garden in the moonlight!” sneered Marise. “How romantic can you get?”
“Oh, we go in for romance down here fairly heavily,” Judy drawled.
And before Marise could manage an answer to that, Judy turned and went on upstairs, leaving Marise to stand staring after her in cold fury and helplessness.
Chapter Nine
It was very early in the morning, and Sam was returning from the morning gallop with which he usually began the day. Rounding a turn in the bridle path that led to his cottage, he reined his horse in so sharply that the gelding reared and almost stood on his hind legs, whinnying to protest the tightened reins.
Sam slid down from the saddle and went swiftly to where Alison stood, crouched against a live-oak tree, a slender, shaking figure in tan slacks and a thin sweater, her shaking hands over her face.
“Here, here, what’s this?” he asked her. She flung herself upon him as his arms closed automatically about her, as though she had been a terrified child. “What happened?” he insisted.
Clinging to him, her hands clutching his shoulders, her tearful face hidden against his chest, she said, “It was horrible. I thought it was a crooked stick, and I started to pick it up, and it wiggled!”
“A snake? What kind of snake?” Sam asked, and looked about swiftly, his arms still holding her.
“I don’t know! I have a thing about snakes. They terrify me and make me slightly sick at my stomach,” she sobbed.
“Was it black? Like a stick?”
“Oh, yes. That’s why I started to pick it up!”
“Well, then it was probably a blacksnake, and they are perfectly harmless. He was probably more frightened than you were. He was taking a snooze in the sunlight, and you probably scared him into going back into hibernation!”
Sam was being deliberately teasing, hoping to bring her out of the near-hysteria. And Alison, sensing his intention, drew a deep, hard breath and drew herself reluctantly from his arms, color rising in her tear-wet cheeks.
“I suppose it was like that,” she agreed. “But if he was any more frightened than I was, I’m truly sorry for him.”
Sam laughed comfortingly.
“Well, now, ma’am, that’s right kind of you,” he retorted, and added, “What are you doing out this early? It’s not seven o’clock yet.”
“I didn’t sleep very well,” she admitted, avoiding his eyes. “And when the birds started singing, I thought I’d get out and see what it was they were singing about.”
“Well, it’s the very nicest part of the morning,” Sam told her. “You haven’t had breakfast, have you?”
“I didn’t even think about breakfast.”
“Good! Then you can have it with me. I haven’t had mine, either. So come along.”
Alison’s eyes widened.
“Your housekeeper won’t mind your bringing a guest home for breakfast without warning her?”
“Who needs a housekeeper just to prepare breakfast?” Sam asked. He tucked her hand through his arm and, with the horse following them docilely, led the way down the path and to the small white cottage.
The house was nestled deep in blossoming shrubbery. There were neat flower-beds along the bricked wall, and gigantic clematis vine flung itself riotously across the small front porch.
“You live here?” Alison asked, enchanted.
“I was born here,” Sam told her as he guided her up the steps and across the small front porch. “You must have grown very tired of hearing about the people who were born at Oakhill, their parents before them and their parents before them! But that’s the way Oakhill grew from a wilderness into what it is today. Come in.”
He pushed open the screen door, and Alison stared.
“You don’t even lock your doors when you go out?” she marveled.
Sam looked quite honestly puzzled.
“Now why would I do that? Nobody here ever does. That’s for city folks. Oakhill people know it’s not necessary here, since we are all known to each other and are friends.”
Alison looked about the neat, small living room, a man’s room obviously. There were comfortable, slightly shabby chairs; a good rug that was worn but whose colors were still bright; reading lamps scattered about; books and magazines spilling from the tables.
“Now you see why I need a housekeeper,” Sam chuckled. “And she will be very upset that I brought somebody here before she had time to clean the room up. I try to keep her from doing it, because when she gets it all tidied up I have trouble finding things.”
“It’s so comfortable-looking,” Alison said wistfully, “as if people really lived here, had roots here, and were not just passing through.”
“Then it’s telling you the truth.” Sam smiled at her. “Come on in the kitchen, and we’ll see about some breakfast.”
Alison said hesitantly, “I can’t cook!”
“So what? I can!” Sam told her. “Bachelors usually learn that early; that is, if they have any idea of remaining bachelors!”
Alison perched on a stool out of his way, her hands folded on her knees, and said, “As of course you do.”
Sam straightened from the big refrigerator that took up half of the kitchen wall, a bowl of eggs in one hand, a container of meat in the other, and his brows drew together in a faint scowl of bewilderment as he repeated, “As of course I do what?”
“Intend to remain a bachelor.”
He put down the eggs and the ham and grinned at her as he lit the gas stove and brought out a heavy blackened skillet.
“You’re quite wrong there,” he assured her. “I don’t intend to remain a bachelor any longer than it takes me to find a girl who’ll have me.”
Alison’s smile was faintly mocking.
“And that’s a terrific task
, of course.”
Breaking eggs into a big yellow mixing bowl, Sam said, unexpectedly grave, “Well, it hasn’t been easy.”
“And the search still goes on?” The mockery had left her voice.
Sam nodded as he beat the eggs briskly, while the thick slices of ham gave off a fragrant odor from the stove.
“The search still goes on,” he repeated. He placed a toaster and a plate containing several slices of bread before her, with a butter dish conveniently at hand. “You mind the toast while I get the coffee going.”
Working at the stove, seeing that everything was as it should be, he glanced at her now and then, and a tender smile touched his mouth. For she was like a child, so absorbed in the small task he had assigned her that she didn’t even look up at him. She waited, bent over the toaster, and as the toast popped up, she buttered it with a concentrated attention that made him suddenly deeply aware of her as a delightful person.
When at last the meal was ready and they were settled at the table, she looked across at him and said humbly, “I never realize quite how stupid I am until a time like this. Only there’s never been a time like this for me before. I mean helping to get breakfast, even if all I did was butter the toast. I know all about calling room service and ordering food, and planning menus with a haughty chef and all that. But working with my hands—well, the typewriter is about the extent of my ability.”
“I missed you last night,” Sam told her quietly, his eyes catching the brief flush that crept over her face.
“I had some letters to write for Marise,” she explained, and would not meet his eyes.
“And they couldn’t have been done today?”
“Marise didn’t think so.”
Suddenly she put down her fork and the bit of buttered toast and clenched her hands tightly in her lap, as she lifted her chin with a hint of defiance.
“I suppose you despise me,” she said through her teeth.
Puzzled, Sam studied her.
“Now why would you suppose a thing like that?” he asked.
“For, well, for hanging onto Marise no matter how badly she treats me. Oh, she does; I admit it. She treats everybody shamefully if she can get away with it. And for those of us she calls her entourage—most of all—I have to admit that—” Her voice stumbled and broke and fell into a miserable silence.