Dovie laid a hand on Dora’s arm. She could feel the tremors running through the woman’s fragile body. Or maybe it was she who was trembling. It was torture sitting there, listening to Dora tell her story, knowing, perhaps better than she, what came next. And yet there was nothing to do but listen as the rest came pouring out.
“We grappled for days, she and I. She was set on keeping that baby, husband or no. She didn’t understand what it would mean, how people would look at her, how it would ruin her. I was at the end of my tether. I . . . threatened to call the constable. They’d arrest you in those days for that kind of thing—not the boys, mind you, just the girls. I don’t know how I ever could have said such a thing. I’d bite off my tongue before saying it now, but I did say it. I was that desperate to keep the tongue-waggers from finding out. I told her . . ” Dora’s head fell again, another stifled sob escaping her. “I told her if she didn’t go to the unwed mothers’ home I would turn her out, disown her. That’s the moment I lost her, when I said that awful thing.”
Heart aching, Dovie covered the old woman’s hands with her own, surprised to find them ice-cold. Even knowing what had come of Dora’s dreadful edict—the hardships and horrors her daughter had been forced to endure—a small part of her understood. Dora Tandy had acted out of desperation and a need to protect her child at all costs, to spare her the treatment she herself had endured as an unwed mother.
“Please don’t torture yourself.” Dovie knew the words were useless, but there was nothing else to say, no words of comfort to be found. In the end, Dora was to blame.
“I’ve been torturing myself all these years. I’m afraid I don’t know how to stop. And it’s what I deserve, isn’t it? She came home, after, but not to stay. She was there just long enough to pack her things and make off with the money I’d been saving for her to go to university. Then she disappeared. A year later, there was a letter from Charleston saying she’d found a job, and promising never to come back to Sennen Cove. And she didn’t. I never saw her again—or my grandchild. I think of the babe sometimes, even after all these years, and wonder what became of it, if it was boy or a girl, if it’s still alive somewhere in the world. It’s why I came. I had to see Alice one last time before I . . . I had to see her one last time, to beg her forgiveness. I didn’t know she was gone until I went to the address on the envelope and asked after her. The maid who answered the door looked at me funny and said I must be from out of town. She said everyone in Charleston knew where to find Alice Tandy.”
Dora’s sobs came in earnest then, breaking in great heaving shudders. Dovie tightened her grip on the woman’s arm but remained silent. There were no words to comfort a mother whose daughter had died despising her.
Finally, her tears ran out. She fumbled a moment to open the old black handbag and extricate another rumpled tissue. “Poor girl,” she said, blotting her eyes. “I’m sorry to go all cakey, prattling on like an old fool, and to a perfect stranger. I’ll go now, and leave you to your young man.”
Dovie watched as Dora fumbled with her handbag, breathless and clumsy. She didn’t look well, certainly not well enough to drive herself back to wherever she’d come from. “Did you drive here today, Dora?”
“Taxi.” Her voice was thready again, her breath coming in short, thin bursts, and the bluish tint had reappeared around her mouth.
“Is there anyone I can call? Anyone who could pick you up and maybe look after you?”
“No one. I just need a taxi, and I’ll . . . be on my way.”
Dovie checked her watch, thought of the budget folder sitting on her desk, and made a decision. “No. I’ll drive you back. Just give me a minute to make a call.”
Stepping away, she punched Jack’s cell number into her phone, half hoping as she waited for him to pick up that the call would go straight to voice mail. It didn’t.
“Hello, Dovie. What’s up?”
Had she only imagined the gruff impatience in his tone? She didn’t think so. “Hey, Jack. I just wanted to let you know that something’s come up, and I’m going to be late getting back. It’s a . . . a friend of mine. She’s sick and I need to drive her home. I was wondering if there was any way we could push the two o’clock meeting to three?”
There was a pause, the kind that meant the person on the other end was weighing his words before speaking. “Dovie, you know how important this fund-raiser is, right?”
“Yes, of course I do.”
“And that we can’t afford to look like we don’t know what we’re doing with Gemma Tate’s endowment and this new wing?”
Dovie closed her eyes, gnawing her lower lip. “Yes.”
“Good. I just wanted to make sure. Take care of what you need to take care of, and we’ll reschedule in the morning. I’m booked today, from three on.”
There was no time to say thank you before the line went dead.
Dora protested the whole way down the path, arguing that she was quite capable of taking a taxi, but finally divulged the name of her motel—the Palmetto Moon. Dovie recognized the name as soon as it was out of Dora’s mouth. She had mentioned it in her letter to Alice. She knew the place, an old flat-roofed mom-and-pop out on Highway 17, popular for its budget rates and no-frills efficiencies.
They drove in silence. Dovie resisted the urge to ask questions. The less she spoke, the less chance there was of blurting out details she had no legitimate way of knowing. Her thoughts crept to the letters in her purse. Maybe she should just come clean and hand them over. They didn’t belong to her. But was there anything to be gained by giving Dora the letters? Perhaps, in the old woman’s case, as Josiah said, the not knowing was a blessing. At least that’s what she told herself as she pulled into the Palmetto Moon’s rutted parking lot.
“I’m there on the end,” Dora told her, pointing to the end unit near a kidney-shaped swimming pool. “You can just drop me at the door.”
The lot was small and crowded with cars that had seen more than their fair share of miles. Dovie pulled into the space in front of unit 12 and cut the engine, scouting her surroundings while Dora fumbled in her purse. Finally, she produced a large plastic key fob stamped with the number 12. Dovie reached for it, and got out of the car. “I want to make sure you get in okay.”
Actually, she wanted to make sure the place wasn’t infested with roaches—or worse, was some kind of firetrap. A whiff of musty air greeted them as they pushed inside—dampness mixed with Pine-Sol and less-than-clean carpeting. It was everything Dovie had expected, cramped and shabby, though minus the roaches, thank heavens. There was a bed with a faded floral spread, a small table and a pair of chairs, a vintage television and battered dresser, and in one corner, a tiny kitchenette equipped with a minifridge, a two-burner stove, and a sink barely large enough to accommodate a dinner plate. Depressing, but habitable.
“Not much of a place, is it?” Dora said, as if reading her mind. “But it’s what I could afford. I booked for a full month, but now . . .”
Now Alice was dead, and there was no reason to stay. That was what she’d been about to say. “You’ll be going back to Cornwall, I suppose?”
Dora looked up from the handbag she’d been placing on the dresser. “I don’t recall saying I was from Cornwall. Did I?”
Dovie could have kicked herself. She’d always been clumsy when it came to secrets. “No,” she said, recovering quickly. “You didn’t tell me. But I recognized your accent. I spent some time in the U.K. when I was in college.”
If Dora found the explanation suspect she gave no sign. Instead, she shook her head. “Bought one of those cheap, nonrefundable tickets, so I’m here awhile yet, like it or not. I thought there’d be time, you see. I thought we’d talk things out, that maybe I could make amends. But I was too late.”
Dovie pressed her lips together, reminding herself that none of this was her business. And yet she’d made it her business, hadn’t she,
the minute she picked up the letter from Alice’s grave? She was convinced that she was right about Alice’s letters. Keeping them from Dora was an act of kindness, a way of shielding her from the horrors her daughter had suffered during her stay at Blackhurst. But did that mean Dora shouldn’t at least try to discover what had befallen Alice after leaving Cornwall?
Surely the Tates would be able to provide some information. How she died. What sort of life she had lived. If she’d ever found her child. Not that she was in any position to presume on her connection with the Tates—if you could even call it a connection. And there were risks on that front. What if, while attempting to trace her daughter’s footsteps, she was to get wind of the rumors surrounding Alice and Harley Tate? For an instant, the voice in her head was back, warning her to steer clear of things that didn’t concern her. Then she looked at Dora, at her weary posture and desolate expression, and pushed the voice aside. “Have you thought about trying to learn what happened to your grandchild?”
A parade of emotions passed over Dora’s face as she sagged down onto the edge of bed. “I tried once, back home, but there aren’t any records. Blackhurst—that’s the place I sent Alice—is closed now, and no one seems able to help me. They don’t like folk nosing around about those places, not even family—or maybe especially family. All I know is most of the babies born there wound up in America or Canada.”
“It’s a start, at least,” Dovie said. “And a lot of old records are online now, which would make it easier. You’d be surprised what people turn up.”
“It’s been so long. I wouldn’t know where to begin—or how.”
Dovie stared at the poor woman, at the despair etched into her withered face, the hope laid bare in her gray eyes, and felt herself wavering. Would it be so wrong, so unthinkable, to contact Gemma Tate and ask a few questions on behalf of a grieving mother? To risk offense in the name of compassion? She already knew what Jack would say if he ever got wind of her intentions. It would begin with What the hell were you thinking? and end with her on the unemployment line. And yet she couldn’t help herself. The words were out before she could weigh them further. “I think I might be able to help.”
The next morning, Jack was waiting in her office when she arrived, seated in one of the conference chairs in front of her desk. He glanced at his watch as she stepped through the door, prompting her to glance at her own. Right on time, thank God, though she could see that he was still miffed about their meeting yesterday.
“Morning, Jack,” she said, trying to sound nonchalant as she slid behind her desk. “About yesterday—”
“I know. You had to drive a sick friend home.”
Dovie bristled at the unspoken implication that she had made up the story. “I did, as a matter of fact. Her name is Dora, and she’s . . . she’s . . .” Dovie let the words dangle. What was she?
Jack stood, his pink face grim as he crossed to the door and closed it. “You were at the cemetery again, I take it, when you called me?”
“I was at lunch when I called you,” Dovie shot back.
“Dovie, I don’t pretend to understand your need to go and sit with a bunch of dead people, but if that does it for you, great. My concern isn’t where you eat your lunch. It’s that you sometimes forget to come back. And then, when you do finally get back to your desk, you seem to have left your mind behind. You can’t deny it.”
He was right; she couldn’t.
The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable. Finally, Jack let out a breath, resignation or disgust; Dovie wasn’t sure which. “The proposal you were supposed to have ready for yesterday’s meeting—do you have it?”
Dovie’s gaze slid to the folder sitting on the corner of her desk. She’d meant to bring it home last night, to check her figures and give it one last polish, but she forgot to slip it into her tote when she left the office, and hadn’t remembered until after midnight. “I’ll definitely have it for you by the time we meet.”
Jack leveled a hard gaze at her across the desk. “We’re meeting now, Dovie. This is the meeting.”
Dovie’s mouth went dry as she once again groped for words. “It just needs a few finishing touches, Jack. I can have it ready in—”
“It was supposed to be ready yesterday, Dovie. Not today. Not later. Yesterday.”
Dovie could only nod. His tone stung, perturbed, and more than a little weary, as if she’d just told him the dog had eaten her homework. “I’m sorry, Jack.”
“Dovie, we’ve talked about this. In fact, we seem to keep talking about it. I’ve cut you plenty of slack—you can’t say I haven’t—but we’re coming to a place where I’m going to have to make a decision. Sooner or later the board is going to notice things are falling through the cracks—things under your purview. And then it’s going to be my ass on the line, since I’m the one who put you in that chair. It’s not that I minded covering for you. I was happy to do it—in the beginning. But I can’t keep pretending you’re up to this when it’s becoming more and more obvious that you’re not.”
Dovie remained mute. How could she defend herself when he was right? Her mind was somewhere else most of the time, and the whys and wheres didn’t matter. “You’re right, Jack,” she said, struggling past the sudden sting in her throat. “About all of it. I have been . . . distracted. All I can say is I’m sorry, and I promise to get myself together.”
“Sooner would be better than later,” he said, then softened his tone. “This new wing, and everything to do with it, starting with the fund-raiser, has got to go down without a hitch. No gaffes. No overruns. No oversights.”
“Yes.”
“I mean it, Dovie. I won’t be able to help you if you blow this.”
Dovie folded her hands on her desk blotter and met his gaze squarely. “You won’t have to, Jack. And I won’t make you fire me. If there’s a problem, any kind of problem, I’ll resign.”
EIGHT
MAGNOLIA GROVE CEMETERY
CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA
OCTOBER 6, 2005
Austin’s stomach clenched as he rounded the curve and saw the angel come into view. He didn’t like cemeteries, this one least of all, but he’d promised. And so here he was, while his mother lay in a dark room with a cold compress over her eyes, fighting another of the debilitating migraines that had escalated in both frequency and intensity since his father’s death. Stress, the doctors said, which was the only reason he’d decided to stop shirking his duty and assume the reins of the largest real estate development firm in the southeastern United States.
But there had been a few bonuses. Like imagining Harley Tate rolling in his grave when he began changing the way the family firm conducted business, starting with the immediate cessation of all dealings with his father’s old business cronies—men so crooked they’d have to be screwed into the ground when they died. King Tate. That was how he’d always thought of his father, because that was how he treated people: contemptuous of his subjects, dismissive of his wife, and disgusted with the prince and heir who had never lived up to his expectations.
Well, it was his turn to wear the crown now. And if he was going to be chained to a desk, he was damn sure going to make it worth his while, starting with a big fat endowment to Charleston Museum of Cultural Arts in his mother’s name. God knew, after thirty years of marriage the woman deserved some kind of reward, if not a medal. Next was his BuildGreen initiative, something he’d tried for years to get his father to consider, not just because it played to Charleston’s shifting demographics, but because it was the right thing to do. His father would have despised both ideas, but he didn’t care. Tate Development had been greasing palms and cutting corners for years, getting rich off the backs of Charleston and its residents. Now it was time to give back. To hell with the old man.
It was hardly an appropriate thought to have while standing in front of his father’s grave, he knew, but what else did h
e have? There were no good memories. No Saturdays spent fishing. No playing catch in the backyard. No camping trips to the mountains. None of the father-son stuff most guys had to look back on when their fathers passed away. He’d been left with nothing to mourn. He’d worn the appropriate expression of grief at the funeral, said all the proper and respectful things. He’d gotten good at that—at the show. Wearing the right face, feigning things he didn’t feel, maybe because life had given him so many opportunities to practice.
His mother, though, was a different story. Her grief was all too real, as fresh and raw as the day her husband had died. It baffled him, that kind of love—the kind that kept right on loving, despite the costs. But Gemma Tate was made of strong stuff, built to bend but never break. And she’d been tested over the years. Survival instinct, some would say. Perhaps that was where he’d learned it. And yet he’d never understand how she could mourn Harley Tate—a man who had treated her like part of his portfolio, just another asset to be leveraged.
Enough, Austin told himself. He wasn’t here to confront his father’s ghost. He glanced at the bouquet of pink peonies he had just picked up from Morton’s—Alice’s favorite. For as long as he could remember, his mother had had a standing order for a bouquet of pink peonies every sixth of October, in honor of her dear friend’s birthday. Only this year, she wasn’t able to bring them herself.
Love, Alice Page 7