The Women of Eden

by Marilyn Harris

  He was aware of Burke standing before the desk. "Will you do it, Delane?" he asked. "Will you go tomorrow? I must know. Something has happened. Otherwise she would have—"

  "Has it occurred to you, Burke," Delane commenced, hoping if not to shock him into good sense at least to mildly hurt him, "that the young woman was merely playing a game with you?"

  "No."

  "Why not? It is a good possibility. Her entire life has been a prolonged exercise in pampered boredom."

  "That's not true."

  "She must take her sport where she can find it, and how better than with an American who so outraged her cousin?"

  "That is simply not true," Burke insisted, his hands on the desk.

  Dear God, he appears to be literally unhinged. "Burke, please," Delane soothed, trying to ease him back into the chair and a degree of rationality. In spite of the fact that he did not sit, at least he was quiet. "What exactly is it that you want me to do with this—tale you've just delivered? Surely you don't expect me to take it seriously?"

  "I want your assistance with one small matter."

  "Small?" Delane asked, anger rising. "At the moment I am the chief target of Eden's rage. Look," he commanded and shoved the parchment from Andrew Rhoades across the desk, thinking that now

  was as good a time as any. Let Burke see for himself the hazardous days ahead where the Eden family was concerned.

  Distracted, Burke started to ignore the parchment, but then something caught his eye. Delane saw him lift the paper toward the light of a lamp.

  "My God, is he still pushing it?" he muttered.

  **Apparently.''

  "Is this a subpoena?"

  "No, not exactly, but I'd be a fool not to be there on the tenth of December."

  "What will they ask you?"

  "What do you think they'll ask?" Delane snapped, astonished at Burke's sudden denseness.

  "My—identity?"

  Delane nodded.

  "And will you tell them?"

  "Under oath I'll have no other choice."

  Their eyes held, the full consequence of the hearing dawning on Burke. He read the parchment again, then tossed it onto the desk as though it were a matter of unconcern to him.

  "Then do it," he announced coldly. "Tell Eden what he wants to know. It will come out sooner or later, anyway. In the meantime, will you please do this one favor for me—seek out Elizabeth and try to find-"

  My God! One man in this oflSce was mad, and Delane knew who it was, and raged at the loss of his rational friend. "I will do nothing," he shouted across the desk, "for your own sake!"

  "For my sakel" Burke replied, suffering anger of his own. **What am I asking that is so unreasonable?"

  "If you don't know, there's no way I can tell you."

  "Please do. I thought I could count on your understanding."

  "In all matters, you can, except the ones that threaten to destroy both of us."

  "How would a simple inquiry destroy us? The house does not belong to John Murrey Eden. Mary has told me so. What right does he have to tell your friend Elizabeth who calls or who doesn't?"

  "John Murrey Eden does not need a rightl" exploded Delane, slamming his fist down against the desk. "I thought you knew the man better than that. A Demi-God. Your words, not mine. He con-

  trols everything he touches. And for his enemies he reserves a special hell."

  Slowly Burke stood up from his desk. *Tou're afraid of him," he accused softly.

  Struggling for control and losing the battle, Delane scooped up the parchment, crushing it in his fist. "Do you know what this means?" he demanded, aware that he was trembling under the duress of his anger. "Not to me," he added. "I'm in a position of relative safety. My reputation will ultimately protect me. But to youl" He stopped, his mind m.oving to a piece of recent history, the gruesome suicide of a corrupt solicitor named Morley Johnson, who had abused the Eden fortune and, in the process, had incurred the wrath of John Murrey Eden. Perhaps the Divinity would say that Johnson had no right to live, but only a demon divinity would have hounded, pursued, humiliated and ultimately destroyed him as Eden had done. The man had been found hanging by the neck in a rat-infested flat near the docks, scarcely enough skin on him to cover his bones, festering sores on his limbs and a peculiar look of relief on his swollen face, as though it mattered not where he was going, heaven or hell, it would be preferable to this world and the pursuit of John Murrey Eden.

  Unfortunately his memory, instead of tempering his anger, only served to increase it, as he replaced in his mind's eye Morley Johnson's face with Burke Stanhope's. He hfted the parchment for the inspection of the man opposite him.

  "This could very well be your death warrant," he said quietly, aware of the melodrama of his words yet somehow feeling that they were not strong enough. "Quite obviously," he continued, "this could spell the end of my protection. Don't you see, it's not rne they are after. It's you. And the fact that I'm in possession of this parchment at all should tell you clearly of the man's need for revenge. And how precisely do you think he'll react when he learns that not only have you slandered his name but that you have compromised his cousin as well?"

  "There has been no compromise," Burke replied. "Our meetings have been honorable."

  "And secret."

  "There was no other way."

  "And there still is no other way," Delane stressed. "For your own

  sake as well as the young lady's, I would strongly advise that you bring the entire episode to a close.'*

  "I can't do that."

  "You—have—no—choice!" Delane thundered, aware that nothing he had said had made the slightest difference.

  "The matters are unrelated."

  "God in heaven, Burkel Can't you hear yourself? You're not making sense."

  "Perhaps not your kind of sense. But then you can't understand."

  Delane started to say more but found that he couldn't. The young man standing opposite him had just made a strangely eloquent response, a look of resignation, a suggestion that all arguments were impotent.

  Confronted by such a response, Delane felt for his chair, which had been pushed back in anger, dragged it forward and sat like a man defeated.

  Having drained himself of all argument, he asked, "Would you consider going home for a while? Back to America?"

  "There is nothing for me in America."

  Delane rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes. "Then what do you intend to do?"

  "As soon as I can, to find out precisely what has befallen her. As soon as I can, to see her again. As soon as I can, to ask her to become my wife."

  Hearing the path to self-destruction spelled out so calmly, a groan escaped Delane's lips. Not until he heard the office door close could he jar himself out of this lethargy, and then it was too late.

  "Burke, wait!" he called out.

  But no one waited and, in a fit of anger, Delane picked up the empty brandy snifter and hurled it across the room, where it struck the edge of the table and shattered, the noise of destruction setting a proper tone for the days ahead.

  He remained at his desk all night, his mind trying to work through to a simple solution. It was in this distracted and confused state that his assistant editor found him the next morning and informed him of the events of the London night which might be newsworthy for an evening edition of the Times: a carriage accident near the White Bear in Piccadilly and a spectacular fire near the river in an old abandoned barracks. Three corpses had been found among the smoking

  ruins, their bodies burned beyond recognition. Transients probably, who had sought refuge in the old structure.

  "Run them all," Delane said, only half listening to the news stories, which had nothing to do with his present burden, which was the need to know precisely how far John Murrey Eden would go in his quest for revenge.

  Cambridge Late November 1870

  For three days Richard had tried to shake the gloom brought on by John's letter announcing his imm
inent arrival sometime before the first of December^ a perplexing letter where each sentence provoked a question.

  Behind him where he stood at the window keeping watch on the road below, he was aware of old Mrs. Pettibone's quiet fussing at the table, setting service for three, the small informal dinner having been Bertie's idea, that since Aslam had been mentioned by John in detail, then perhaps Aslam could shed more light on the disturbing letter. To that end Bertie had taken the gig about an hour ago to fetch Aslam and bring him back for a subtle question-and-answer period.

  Still holding John's letter, as though somehow he'd failed to perceive some vital clue, Richard glanced down on the road below, dreading the evening. Aslam had grown so distant during the last few months, as though Richard had offended him. Yet he'd done nothing but try to fill the void caused by Bertie's move into the private rooms in town, a move which had left Richard bereft. Gradually the rooms in town were used less frequently, and slowly Bertie was moving some of his clothes back, his fears receding with the disappearance of the strange man whom he'd thought was spying on them.

  Finally, for the last two weeks with Bertie's good-natured laugh filling the daylight hours in the flat and his consistently healing love filling the night hours, life had resumed, as steady and as rewarding as ever.

  "Will you be taking wine, Lord Eden?**

  The question had come from Mrs. Pettibone, who hovered over the table, three wineglasses in hand.

  "Yes, please," Richard said.

  From the window he watched, detecting something sly in her smile. Dear Heaven, he was growing as suspicious as Bertie. To be sure, the old woman was the worst sort of country gossip, but Richard paid her handsomely and doubted if she would do anything to jeopardize the source of her income.

  "When you finish there, that will be all, Mrs. Pettibone. Professor Nichols and I can manage—and we don't want to keep you too late into the evening."

  He saw a look of disappointment on her face, as though she'd been looking forward to staying.

  "Well, I'm not finished. Lord Eden," she pouted. **I have a few more things to do in the kitchen, then, I assure you, I'll spare you my company."

  "Mrs. Pettibone, I—"

  But she was gone and he would have to make his apologies later, perhaps in the form of a bonus. Repeatedly Bertie had told him how unskilled he was in the handling of servants.

  Bertie.

  How many times in the last three days he and Bertie had studied John's letter and, with the intention of studying it again, he took it to his desk in the alcove off the front parlor, flattened the pages, drew a lamp near and commenced reading the words that he knew by heart.

  The opening was a simple salutation. It was the second paragraph where the mysteries commenced:

  I will be travelling back to London from Cheltenham around the first of December, after having ensconced Mary in Miss Veal's establishment. I'm not certain whether or not anyone has written to you, but Mary has suffered an illness. . . .

  There the questions started. What illness? And if she were truly ill, then the rigorous discipline of school would be the last thing she needed.

  Then to the third paragraph:

  I will take the time to come to Cambridge for the purpose of retrieving Aslam from that unproductive atmosphere. . . .

  Cambridge had been John's idea. He'd forced it on Aslam several years ago. Now what had happened to convert it into an "unproductive atmosphere"?

  I require his services here to work with me in the firm and he can conclude his studies within the Temple. I count among my friends several prominent solicitors who will be happy to sponsor him.

  Where was Andrew Rhoades in all of this? If Aslam was to be transplanted to London, why wasn't Andrew his sponsor?

  As always, all his vague apprehensions gradually narrowed into one, the constant nightmare, the secret knowledge of what he was. It wasn't shame he felt. How could such a healing love be shameful or wrong? It was simply his awareness of the abyss between his self-concept and that of the world.

  "Well, now I believe everything is in order. Lord Eden."

  He looked up at the sound of the voice and saw Mrs. Pettibone standing in the door, adjusting her black bonnet. "Country cooking is all it is, but I hope it suits."

  "It will," he said with a smile, joining her in the parlor. "And for your trouble, here's a bit extra," he added, withdrawing from his pocket a pound note and pressing it into her gloved hand.

  "Lord!" she gasped, carefully tucking the precious note into her handbag. "Well, then," she said, looking up> "have a pleasant evening, sir, and I'll be back first thing in the morning to straighten up."

  "I'm grateful," he said, nodding, and walked behind her to the door, eager to see her on her way.

  At the door she stopped and looked back, that same sly smile on her face which he'd detected earlier. "I was—just wondering—will Professor Nichols be moving back in—a permanent way?"

  "Yes," he said, hoping that an affirmative answer would make it come true, "though why do you ask? What concern is it—"

  "What concern!" she echoed. "I'm the one who straightens up after the two of you, remember? Perhaps I'd better go back and put clean linens on his bed now—"

  "It won't be necessary, Mrs. Pettibone," Richard interrupted. "We can attend to that ourselves," he added, thinking with sadness of the charade they had to perform, sharing the same bed, then mussing the other for appearance's sake.

  Weary and anxious before the evening had even started, Richard pulled open the door in an attempt to speed the old busybody on her way. "Again, my thanks, Mrs. Pettibone. We'll try not to leave too much in the way of a mess for you in the morning."

  With growing apprehension he kept her in his sights until the door below closed and still he stood, staring down the darkened stairs, bewildered by her curiosity concerning Bertie.

  Not until he heard the sound of a carriage on the cobbles beyond the garden did he abandon his position at the door and hurry back to the window.

  With relief he recognized the gig, saw Bertie chmbing down, and saw-Nothing else.

  He hurried to the door and was there to greet Bertie as he climbed the stairs. "Where's Aslam?" Richard demanded. "Did something—"

  "He couldn't come," Bertie said. As though to halt any further interrogation he hfted his head toward the kitchen and the good odors of Mrs. Pettibone's stew. "The smells of heaven!" he exclaimed.

  "Bertie, what happened?" Richard persisted, taking his cloak, knowing him well enough to be alarmed by this evasion. "What did he say?" he prodded, trying to ignore the sense of alarm growing within him.

  Slowly Bertie commenced shaking his head. "The boy was polite at first," he began, "He asked me to convey to you his apologies, said that you knew John better than he and knew his impatience when people were not ready."

  "What else did he say?" Richard asked, his anxiety increasing along with the mystery.

  Bertie turned away and began riffling through the papers on his desk. "I've told you, Richard."

  "You've not told me anything."

  The hands collecting the papers ceased. "No," Bertie confessed, and the ease on his face was obliterated. "Like you, at some point I became insistent, but the more I insisted, the more belligerent he became."

  "Belligerent?" Richard found the image a difficult one.

  "Although I knew I was pushing too hard," Bertie added, "I felt a need to push hard, knew that something was bothering the boy. Finally he announced that the truth of the matter was that he had no desire to come."

  "No—desire?" Richard murmured, wondering what had happened to that affectionate relationship he'd once shared with Aslam.

  "Finally," Bertie concluded, "I pressed one last time and was told in angry tones that he had been ordered to have nothing to do with us-"

  Richard suffered a sudden heat on his face.

  "—that he had been told to remain in his attic, prepare his belongings, and exchange no discourse with us."
>
  The words, so bluntly delivered, had an air of unreality about them. Though he knew the answer to his next question, he asked it anyway. "On—whose orders?"

  "John's."

  In an attempt to remain calm, he walked the short distance into his alcove study, aware of Bertie following behind him, his voice calm.

  "He knows," he said, and in that simple manner confirmed Richard's worst nightmare.

  Clinging to the last vestige of hope, Richard asked, "How can we be sure? And what difference does it make?"

  "To me, none," Bertie said. "To you, I'm afraid, everything."

  "What will-he do?"

  "Perhaps nothing," Bertie said quietly. "Surely there are enough other complications in his life. Why should he concern himself with us? Perhaps his only concern is that Aslam not be—corrupted." Bertie shrugged. "In that case, he will come and fetch the boy and that will be that."

  There was something hollow in his comfort as well as his words. John, as Richard knew all too well, was not given to simple solutions. What would he do without Bertie and where would he go and how would he survive?

  "Give me your hand," Bertie commanded gently.

  Richard obeyed and the contact seemed to lighten the darkness, though their hands were motionless and did not press each other. Richard even moved slightly away. But his consciousness was focused in the perception of that small area where their hands touched. And he suffered the desire to talk about the beauty and the strange power of love, but to talk without violating the silence. He thought that they ought to say something and he wanted to, but he didn't dare.

  "I'm here," Bertie whispered. . . .

  Who would blame her?

  Neither God nor man, for what was a sixty-seven-year-old lady to do but take from any hand that was prepared to give?

  Widowed since she was forty, though that was a case of good riddance if ever there was one, Cella Pettibone had had to fend for herself in a world hostile to women and widows.

  As she hurried through the night, her destination clear, she felt of the crisp new pound note tucked inside her purse, a new addition for the thirty-seven already tucked safely away in the tin beneath her mattress.