Davenport House 6: House Secrets

by Marie Silk

  Mary shrugged. “Why not?”

  “Oh you are no help, Mary,” Clara teased. “I’m going to ask Ethan if he’ll find out what Joe thinks of me. Ethan and Joe have become rather chummy since they helped Sam build the cabin.”

  “Let me know how it goes,” Mary said wryly.

  Clara set the flowers in a vase beside Mary before she went down the hallway to peer into Abigail’s room. Ethan was there sitting in the rocking chair with Patrick asleep on his chest. “Is Abigail here?” asked Clara.

  “She went into town with Fiona. They are shopping for wedding clothes, I guess,” he replied.

  “Well it was you I wanted to speak to anyway,” Clara said. “What do you think of my hair?”

  Ethan groaned. “I don’t know anything about girls’ hair.”

  “Does the shortness make me terribly unattractive?”

  Ethan glanced around the room for an escape, but Clara stood in the doorway of the room. “It’s fine,” he answered.

  “Does Joe ever say anything about me? Has he said anything about my hair?”

  Ethan searched his mind for an excuse to leave the room as quickly as possible, but Clara continued to look at him expectantly. He sighed in reluctance. “If there was ever a conversation about your hair, I sure don’t remember it.”

  Clara turned to see Abigail approaching from the hallway. She moved to the side to let Abigail through the doorway, and Ethan wasted no time in finding an escape. He handed Patrick to Abigail and fled down the hallway. Abigail was perplexed. “What was that all about?”

  Clara sighed. “I suppose I asked him too many questions about my hair.”

  Abigail giggled. “That explains his sudden departure.”

  “Did you enjoy your shopping with Fiona?” Clara asked.

  “It was enjoyable. In the end, Fiona decided that she would like to make her own dress. I am going to help her.”

  “I’ll miss you when you move away again,” Clara told her sadly.

  “It’s kind of you to say. Although, we have postponed our move so many times, perhaps you will be glad to see us go when we finally do.”

  “I don’t see how I could be,” Clara said, reaching toward the baby to stroke his cheek. “When this little one begins to speak, would you please have him call me Aunt Clara? I’m about to give up on ever having a family of my own. At least I might have some lovely children to call me aunt.”

  “What about Mr. Blake?”

  “What about him?” Clara laughed. “He hasn’t said a thing about his intentions for me.”

  Abigail raised her eyebrow. “Even if that is the case…I would not rule him out yet.”

  Clara looked hopeful. “Has he said something to you?”

  “I’ve seen the two of you together—the way he looks at you when he comes for dinner—he doesn’t have to say anything aloud for everyone to know that he admires you. No, Clara, if I were you, I would not rule him out yet.” Clara smiled as she left the room with a newfound hope for the future.

  At the stable of Davenport House, Ethan was saddling his horse for a ride. Joe walked into the stable with his usual greeting. “Howdy, neighbor.”

  “Howdy,” Ethan replied. “You need a hand with something?”

  “No, I just thought I’d mosey on over for—well I suppose I don’t have a good excuse,” he said with a laugh. “I wondered about Clara. What do you think of her?”

  Ethan groaned and wished he had finished saddling the horse two minutes earlier. “She’s alright.”

  “She sure is,” Joe replied. “Say, does she ever talk about me?”

  Ethan shook his head in disbelief. “As a matter of fact, she just had me cornered in the house asking questions about what you thought of her.”

  Joe’s face lit up. “She did?”

  Ethan nodded.

  “Well? What did you tell her?”

  Ethan laughed and hoisted himself onto the horse before he answered. “I ran away. You’ll have to tell Clara what you think of her yourself.” And with that, Ethan rode out of the stable into the fresh autumn air.

  He returned from his ride just in time to change for dinner. Abigail was in the bedroom and had already changed her clothes when Ethan arrived. “I’m going to put Patrick to bed in the nursery,” she told him. “I’ll be right down for dinner.”

  “Then I’ll wait for you,” Ethan said, putting on his tie.

  “Oh don’t worry about me,” Abigail replied. “You go on ahead and I’ll meet you there in a moment.” She left the room with the baby and Ethan headed to the dining room.

  Clara and Joe were just being seated at the dining table. Ethan looked around the room. “Is William coming to dinner?”

  “William is staying upstairs with Mary tonight,” Clara answered. “Where is Abigail?”

  “She’s on her way now,” Ethan said. “I hope.”

  They waited several minutes but Abigail did not come to the table, and the three of them sat there awkwardly.

  “Well I suppose it will just be the three of us,” Clara finally declared.

  After another few minutes of silence, Joe cleared his throat and spoke up. “Sure is nice weather we’re having.”

  “Yes. It is very nice,” Clara agreed.

  Ethan looked longingly toward the entrance, hoping that Abigail would come through at any minute. Then Clara turned to him purposefully. “Ethan, I wondered…what do you think of my hair, now that it is short?”

  Ethan looked down at his plate. “Not this again,” he muttered under his breath. When he looked back at Clara, she seemed to be staring at Joe for a response.

  “It’s nice,” Joe said at last.

  “Why thank you for saying so,” Clara told him.

  “How are your meetings in town coming along?” Joe asked Clara.

  “Very good,” she answered. “Although we will have a long ways to go with women’s rights, even after we do get the vote.”

  “In what way is that?” questioned Joe.

  “In many ways, not the least of which is that a married woman cannot even have her own bank account. Her husband has access to all of her money anytime he wants, but a woman has no such right to her husband’s bank. It’s not right that a man may so easily ruin his wife.”

  “I guess it might be alright if the wife trusted her husband to not do such a thing,” Joe suggested.

  Ethan wondered if either of them would notice if he got up to leave. He quietly lifted his plate and silverware from the table and decided to try it.

  “Ethan, are you going somewhere?” Clara asked.

  “Oh—I’m sorry—I just wanted to go check on Abigail—make sure she has some dinner. Also I think the two of you would like some privacy.”

  Clara was suddenly embarrassed, but Joe spoke up. “Go on then, Ethan,” he said, stifling a smile.

  Ethan gratefully left with his dinner plate and ran into Abigail just outside the dining room. She gave him an apologetic look. “Sorry I took so long. Patrick was not so eager to go to bed as I had hoped.” She continued to walk past him toward the dining room.

  “Wait, don’t go in there,” Ethan whispered. “Let’s just go back upstairs.”

  “What do you mean? I’m feeling rather hungry,” she replied.

  “Here. This is for you,” he said, holding his plate out to her.

  Abigail gave him a puzzled look. “What’s wrong? Why don’t you want to eat in the dining room?”

  Ethan groaned and continued in a whisper. “Joe and Clara are in there, and they’re trying to put me in the middle of things.”

  Abigail covered her mouth as a giggle escaped. “Very well, we will go upstairs. But I’ll need more dinner than your half-eaten plate,” she added.

  “I’ll tell the maids to bring a proper tray,” he promised. “Maybe after tonight, those two won’t be so bad to be around.”

  “Do you think Joe will finally speak up to her?” she asked with wide eyes.

  “If he doesn’t, you and I wil
l take a trip away from the house until he does,” Ethan joked. They made their way up the stairs, leaving Clara and Joe alone in the dining room.

  The two ate in silence, even though each of them looked as though they wanted to say something to the other. Soon they were both staring at the empty plates in front of them.

  “That was a fine meal,” Joe finally said. “Thank you for having me.”

  “Yes, of course. Thank you for coming. I—I enjoy your company very much.”

  “I enjoy your company too,” he said.

  Clara rose from her seat and Joe did the same. “Did you get enough dessert?” she asked suddenly.

  “Yes, I think I had plenty,” he said, suddenly becoming shy.

  “Do you want to stay for tea?”

  Joe looked surprised. “Oh. Sure I do.” But their tea time had less conversation than the dinner. After another round of awkward silence, Joe rose from his seat. “I suppose I should be getting back now.”

  “Oh. I will see you to the door,” Clara said, placing her teacup and saucer on the table.

  They walked together toward the exit that led to the gardens so that Joe did not have to walk around the outside of the house to get home. “Thank you again, Clara,” he said quietly, looking into her eyes. He turned to leave, but Clara reached for his hand.

  “Wait, please,” she said. Her heart began to race when she felt him hold her hand and weave his fingers through hers. “I—I just wanted to know—” Clara stammered. “If you think I should wear my hair long again.”

  Joe was bewildered. “Do you want to?”

  “Well, not really…I just wanted to know if you wanted me to.”

  “It’s your hair,” he chuckled. “You should have it how you want.”

  “Then—it isn’t the reason you won’t kiss me goodbye again?” she blurted.

  “No, that’s not the reason,” he said, taking her other hand in his. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to. I was worried I overstepped the last time because maybe you weren’t ready to trust a man again.”

  “No, you did not overstep—I enjoyed it. I just worried because you never kissed me again after that. I thought it must have been because of something I did wrong, or it was my hairstyle, or the way I speak about politics.”

  “You don’t need to worry what people think of that. You don’t need to change for me or anyone. Then you wouldn’t be you anymore—and you’re the most interesting lady I know. I should never have called you an old spinster. Now I know there’s a lot more to you.”

  Clara blushed furiously and hoped she would not have to give any more hints about what she wanted him to do next. She looked at him intently and said, “I trust you. And I don’t want to be a spinster anymore.” She closed her eyes and soon felt his lips pressing into hers with more intensity than the last time.

  He pulled away slightly, whispering close to her face, “I want to be with you and make you happy, if you want me to.”

  “Yes, I do,” she answered quietly.

  Joe opened his eyes and smiled, waiting for her to meet his gaze. “I promise I won’t interfere with your bank or property or anything else. It’ll all be yours, just as it is now.”

  Clara smiled back. “Thank you for being considerate…but I do trust you, Joe. I don’t want it to be all mine anymore. I want it to be ours. There’s just one thing I hope you’ll agree to.”

  He laughed. “And what is that one thing, that I’m already sure I’ll agree to?”

  Clara beamed with joy as she answered him. “I want to have a big wedding—here at the house, with all of our friends present. I want it to be such a grand event that we will all think of it for a long time to come. It’s what I have wanted ever since I was a girl, and I’ve waited for so very long.”

  “Then the planning can begin this minute,” he replied with a grin. “I think both of us have waited to plan this day for long enough already.”

  ...excerpt from Book 7...

  DAVENPORT HOUSE

  Hard Times

  M A R I E S I L K

  As Mary descended the grand staircase, she could see the new housekeeper pacing anxiously and wringing her hands by the front door. “What is it, Mrs. Spencer?” Mary asked her.

  “Um—there's a lady here to see Miss Clara...”

  Mary sighed. “Clara is not able to receive visitors.”

  “That's just it, Mrs. Hamilton. I told the lady that my Mistress was indisposed, but she would not take no for an answer. She kept asking questions about why Miss Clara would not see her.”

  “Don't worry, I will speak to the lady myself since I'm going outside anyway. I only hope it's not the journalist for that horrid gossip column.” Mary wrapped her shawl around her shoulders and walked out the front door. “Good afternoon,” she greeted the woman who waited at the bottom of the steps.

  The woman had gray hair pulled back into a bun and she stooped forward to balance on a thick wooden cane. Mary was perplexed at the way the woman seemed to stare at her. Mary pulled her shawl tighter around her shoulders as goosebumps covered her arms. She felt relieved when the woman finally stated her business. “I am here to see Clara.”

  “I am sorry, but Clara is indisposed today,” answered Mary. “Would you like me to take a message to her?”

  “What's wrong with her?” asked the woman quickly. “She's not ill, is she?”

  Mary was taken aback that the strange woman would speak so boldly, but Mary was not about to give her any details. “Again, I am sorry, but as I say she cannot receive visitors just now. I am glad to relay any message you may have for her.”

  “No bother,” the woman muttered. “I need to speak with her in person.”

  Mary nodded and tried to smile but felt increasingly awkward under the woman's intent stare. “Very well, Ma'am. If you'll just give me your name—I will tell Clara that you stopped by the house to see her.”

  The woman gaped at her. Mary felt more uncomfortable by the second and regretted that she had not just said goodbye and returned into the house. The woman's voice cracked as she responded emotionally. “Mary! Do you mean to say you don't recognize me? I am your mother!”

  About the Author

  Marie Silk has enjoyed writing stories in many genres since childhood. She lives with her family in the United States and frequently travels the globe to learn more about the world and the people in it. Marie is inspired by history and the feats of humanity from ancient civilization to present day. She is the author of the Davenport House family saga.

  For contact details, exclusive content, and information on upcoming releases, please visit: MarieSilk.com.

  Introducing a very special look into the early years at Davenport House, when the stories of Mary, Clara, Ethan, and Abigail were just beginning...

  DAVENPORT HOUSE Prequel

  Debutante

  M A R I E S I L K

  The family saga begins in Debutante, a prequel to the Davenport House series. Life in 1909 America is explored from the perspectives of the wealthy Davenports and their servants, six years prior to the events of book one.

  While her father is away on business, sixteen-year-old Mary Davenport feels confined and alone, despite her privileged life at the family’s mansion. As the day of Mary’s debutante ball draws near, her controlling mother attempts to separate Mary from her only friend, the lowly son of a servant.

  In a Pennsylvania shantytown, a young girl is hired to make a gown for a debutante ball. She gives up her education so she may earn a wage to help her impoverished family. Neither she nor Mary is aware of how connected their futures are destined to become.

  ...coming soon...

  Cover art by SelfPubBookCovers.com/DianeCostanzaStudio

  Copyright © 2016 by Marie Silk

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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bsp; ISBN: 978-09973352-9-3 (ebook)

  Marie Silk Publishing

  P.O. Box 873

  Hayden ID 83835

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