Just Imagine

  She felt guilty, as if she had somehow shirked her duty by deserting the South to go to school in New York. The music ended, but she wasn’t ready for the dance to be over. And maybe Brandon wasn’t, either, because he made no move to release her. “I imagine you already have a partner for the supper dance.”

  She nodded, then heard herself saying, “But since you’re a neighbor and leaving New York tomorrow, I’m certain Mr. Mayhew won’t object to stepping aside.”

  He lifted her hand and brushed the back of it with his lips. “Then he’s a fool.”

  Elsbeth swooped down on her the moment he took his leave and dragged her to the sitting room that had been set aside for the ladies to tidy themselves.

  “Who is he, Kit? All the girls are talking about him. He looks like a poet. Oh, my! Your bows are coming untied, and you already have a spot on your skirt. And your hair . . .” She pushed Kit down in front of the mirror and snatched out the filigreed silver combs she’d given her last year as a birthday present. “I don’t know why you wouldn’t let me put it up for tonight. It looks so wild like this.”

  “For the same reason I wouldn’t let you lace me into a corset. I don’t like anything that takes away my freedom.”

  Elsbeth gave her an impish smile. “You’re a woman. You’re not supposed to have any freedom.”

  Kit laughed. “Oh, Elsbeth, what would I have done without you these last three years?”

  “Gotten expelled.”

  Kit reached up and squeezed her hand. “Have I ever said thank you?”

  “A hundred times. And I’m the one who should thank you. If it hadn’t been for you, I’d never have learned to stand up for myself. I’m sorry Father’s being so beastly. I’ll never forgive him for not believing you.”

  “I don’t want to come between you and your father.”

  “I know you don’t.” Elsbeth renewed her attack on Kit’s hair. “Why do I bother to scold you for being so untidy? You hardly do anything the way a young lady is supposed to, yet half the men in New York are in love with you.”

  Kit made a face in the mirror. “Sometimes I don’t like the way they look at me. As if I’m not wearing any clothes.”

  “I’m sure you’re imagining it.” Elsbeth finished securing the combs and wound her arms around Kit’s shoulders. “It’s just that you’re so beautiful, they can’t help looking at you.”

  “Silly.” Kit laughed and jumped up from her chair. “His name is Brandon Parsell, and he’s taking me in to supper.”

  “Supper? I thought Mr. Mayhew . . .”

  But it was too late. Kit had already left.

  A waiter came by with a third tray of petits fours. Kit started to reach for one, then caught herself just in time. She’d already had two, and she’d eaten every bite of the food she’d piled onto her plate. If Elsbeth had noticed—as most assuredly she had—Kit would receive another lecture. Templeton Girls ate sparingly at social occasions.

  Brandon took the accusingly empty plate from her and set it aside. “I confess to enjoying a pipe after dinner. Would you be agreeable to showing me the garden? That is, if you don’t mind the smell of tobacco.”

  Kit knew she should be with Bertrand Mayhew now, showing him stereoptic views of Niagara Falls and leading him to a marriage proposal, but she couldn’t summon the will to excuse herself. “I don’t mind at all. When I was younger, I smoked tobacco myself.”

  Brandon frowned. “As I recall, your childhood was unfortunate and best forgotten.” He led her toward the doors that opened into the school’s garden. “It’s amazing how well you’ve managed to overcome the adversity of your upbringing, not to mention being able to live for so long with these Yankees.”

  She smiled as he led her along a brick path hung with paper lanterns. She thought of Elsbeth, Fanny Jennings, Margaret Stockton, and even Mrs. Templeton. “They’re not all bad.”

  “What about the Yankee gentlemen? How do you feel about them?”

  “Some are pleasant, others not.”

  He hesitated. “Have you received any proposals of marriage?”

  “None that I’ve accepted.”

  “I’m glad.”

  He smiled, and without quite knowing how it happened, they were standing still. She felt the whisper of a breeze ruffling her hair. His hands settled on her shoulders. Gently he drew her toward him.

  He was going to kiss her. She knew it would happen, just as she knew she would let him.

  Her first real kiss.

  A frown creased his forehead. He released her abruptly. “Forgive me. I nearly forgot myself.”

  “You were going to kiss me.”

  “I’m ashamed to admit it’s all I’ve been able to think about since I first set eyes on you. A man who presses his attentions on a lady is no gentleman.”

  “What if the lady’s willing?”

  His expression grew tender. “You’re an innocent. Kisses lead to greater liberties.”

  She thought of Eve’s Shame and the lecture on marital relations that all the senior girls had to endure before they graduated. Mrs. Templeton spoke of pain and duty, of obligation and endurance. She advised them to let their husbands have their way, no matter how shocking and horrible it might seem. She suggested they recite verses from the Bible or a bit of poetry while it was going on. But never once did she tell them exactly what Eve’s Shame involved. It was left to their fertile imaginations.

  Lilith Shelton reported that her mother had an aunt who’d gone insane on her wedding night. Margaret said she’d heard there was blood. And Kit had exchanged anxious glances with Fanny Jennings, whose father raised Thoroughbreds on a farm near Saratoga. Only Kit and Fanny had seen the shuddering of a reluctant mare as she was covered by a trumpeting stallion.

  Brandon reached inside his pocket for a pipe and a worn leather tobacco pouch. “I don’t know how you’ve been able to stand living in this city. It’s not much like Risen Glory, is it?”

  “Sometimes I thought I’d die of homesickness.”

  “Poor Kit. You’ve had a rough time of it, haven’t you?”

  “Not as bad as you. At least Risen Glory is still standing.”

  He wandered toward the garden wall. “It’s a fine plantation. Always has been. Your daddy might not have had much sense where womenfolk were concerned, but he knew how to grow cotton.” There was a hollow, hissing sound as he drew on his pipe. He relit it and gazed over at her. “Can I tell you something I’ve never confided to another livin’ soul?”

  A little thrill went through her. “What’s that?”

  “I used to have a secret hankering for Risen Glory. It’s always been a better plantation than Holly Grove. It’s a cruel twist of fate that the best plantation in the country is in the hands of a Yankee.”

  She realized her heart was racing, even as her mind spun with new possibilities. She spoke slowly. “I’m going to get it back.”

  “Remember what I said about self-delusion. Don’t make the same mistakes as the others. “

  “It’s not self-delusion,” she said fiercely. “I’ve learned about money since I’ve been in the North. It’s the great equalizer. And I’ll have it. Then I’m buying Risen Glory back from Baron Cain.”

  “It’ll take a lot of money. Cain has some crazy idea about spinning his own cotton. He’s building a mill right there at Risen Glory. The steam engine just arrived from Cincinnati.”

  This was news Sophronia hadn’t passed on, but Kit couldn’t concentrate on it now. Something too important was at stake. She thought about it for only a moment. “I’ll have fifteen thousand dollars, Brandon.”

  “Fifteen thousand!” In a land that had been stripped of everything, this was a fortune, and for a moment he simply gaped at her. Then he shook his head. “You shouldn’t have told me that.”

  “Why not?”

  “I—I wanted to call on you after you returned to Risen Glory, but what you’ve told me casts a shadow over my motivations.”

  Kit’s own motivations
were so much more shadowy that she laughed. “Don’t be a goose. I could never doubt your motivations. And yes, you may call on me at Risen Glory. I intend to return as soon as I can make the arrangements.”

  Just like that, she made her decision. She couldn’t marry Bertrand Mayhew, not yet anyway, not until she’d had time to see where this exciting new possibility might lead her. She didn’t care what Cain had written in his letter. She was going home.

  That night as she fell asleep, she dreamed of walking through the fields of Risen Glory with Brandon Parsell at her side.

  Just imagine.

  PART THREE

  * * *

  A Southern Lady

  We boil at different degrees.

  RALPH WALDO EMERSON

  “ELOQUENCE”

  7

  The carriage tilted as it swung into the long, winding drive that led to Risen Glory. Kit tensed with anticipation. After three years, she was finally home.

  The deep grooves that had rutted the drive for as long as she could remember had been leveled and the surface spread with fresh gravel. Weeds and undergrowth had been cut back, making the road wider than she recalled. Only the trees had resisted change. The familiar assortment of buckthorn, oak, black gum, and sycamore welcomed her. In a moment she’d be able to see the house.

  But when the carriage rounded the final curve, Kit didn’t even glance that way. Something more important had caught her attention.

  Beyond the gentle slope of lawn, beyond the orchard and the new outbuildings, beyond the house itself, stretching as far as her eyes could see, were the fields of Risen Glory. Fields that looked as they had before the war, with endless rows of young cotton plants stretching like green ribbons across the rich, dark soil.

  She banged the roof of the carriage, startling her companion, so that she let go of the peppermint drop she’d been about to slip into her mouth and lost it in the frilly white folds of her dress.

  Dorthea Pinckney Calhoun gave a shriek of alarm.

  A Templeton Girl, even a rebellious one, understood that she couldn’t travel so far without a companion, let alone stay in the same house with an unmarried man. The fact that he was her cursed stepbrother made no difference. Kit wouldn’t do anything that could give Cain an excuse to send her back, and since he didn’t want her here in the first place, he’d be looking for a reason.

  It hadn’t been hard to find a penniless Southern woman anxious to return to her homeland after years of exile with a widowed Northern sister-in-law. Miss Dolly was a distant relative of Mary Cogdell, and Kit had gotten her name through a letter she received from the minister’s wife. With her tiny stature and her faded blond corkscrew curls, Miss Dolly resembled an aged china doll. Although she was well past fifty, she favored ancient gowns heavy with frills and wide skirts beneath which she never wore any fewer than eight petticoats.

  Kit had already discovered she was a natural coquette, batting the lashes of her wrinkled eyelids at any man she judged to be a gentleman. And she always seemed to be in motion. Her hands in their lacy, fingerless mitts fluttered; her faded curls bobbed, her pastel sashes and antique fringes were never still. She talked of cotillions and cough remedies and a set of porcelain temple dogs that had disappeared along with her girlhood. She was sweet, harmless, and, as Kit had soon discovered, slightly mad. Unable to accept the defeat of her glorious Confederacy, Miss Dolly had permitted herself the small luxury of slipping back in time so that she could forever live in those first days of the war when hopes were high and thoughts of defeat unthinkable.

  “The Yankees!” Miss Dolly exclaimed as the carriage jolted to a stop. “They’re attacking us! Oh, my . . . Oh, my, my . . .”

  In the beginning, her habit of referring to events that had happened seven years before as if they were occurring that very day had been unnerving, but Kit had quickly realized Miss Dolly’s genteel madness was her way of coping with a life she hadn’t been able to control.

  “Nothing like that,” Kit reassured her. “I stopped the carriage. I want to walk.”

  “Oh, dear. Oh, my dear, that won’t do at all. Marauding troops are everywhere. And your complexion—”

  “I’ll be fine, Miss Dolly. I’ll meet you at the house in a few minutes.”

  Before her companion could protest further, Kit stepped out of the carriage and waved the driver on. As the vehicle pulled away, she climbed a grassy hillock so she could get an unrestricted view of the fields beyond the house. Lifting her veil, she shaded her eyes from the late-afternoon sun.

  The plants were about six weeks old. Before long, the buds would open into creamy four-petaled flowers that would give birth to the cotton bolls. Even under her father’s efficient management, Risen Glory hadn’t looked this prosperous. The outbuildings that had been destroyed by the Yankees had been rebuilt, and a new whitewashed fence stretched around the paddock. Everything about the plantation looked well tended and prosperous.

  Her gaze came to rest on the house from which she’d been exiled when she was so young. The front still bowed in a graceful arch, and the color was the same shade of warm cream that she remembered, tinted now by the rose-colored light of the fading sun.

  But there were differences. The red tile roof had been repaired near the twin chimneys, the shutters and front door held a fresh coat of shiny black paint, and, even from a distance, the window glass sparkled. Compared to the lingering devastation she’d seen from the window of the train, Risen Glory was an oasis of beauty and prosperity.

  The improvements should have gratified her. Instead, she felt a mixture of anger and resentment. All this had happened without her. She settled the beaded veil back over her face and headed for the house.

  Dolly Calhoun waited by the carriage steps, her Cupid’s-bow mouth quivering from having been deserted just as she’d arrived at her destination. Kit gave her a reassuring smile, then stepped around the trunks to pay the driver from the last of her allowance money. As he pulled away, she took Miss Dolly’s arm and helped her up the front steps, then lifted the brass knocker.

  The young maid who answered the door was new, and that deepened Kit’s resentment. She wanted to see Eli’s dear, familiar face, but the old man had died the previous winter. Cain hadn’t permitted her to return home to see him buried. Now she had new resentments to join the old, familiar ones.

  The maid glanced curiously at them and then at the array of trunks and bandboxes piled on the piazza.

  “I’d like to see Sophronia,” Kit said.

  “Miz Sophronia’s not here.”

  “When do you expect her?”

  “The Conjure Woman took sick this mornin’ and Miz Sophronia went to check up on her. Don’t know when she’s comin’ back.”

  “Is Major Cain here?”

  “He’ll be comin’ in from the fields any minute now, but he ain’t here yet.”

  Just as well, Kit thought. With any luck, they’d be settled in before he arrived. She clasped Miss Dolly gently by the arm and steered her through the doorway, past the astonished maid. “Please see that our trunks are taken upstairs. This is Miss Calhoun. I’m sure she’d appreciate a glass of lemonade in her room. I’ll wait in the front sitting room for Major Cain.”

  Kit saw the maid’s uncertainty, but the girl didn’t have the courage to challenge a well-dressed visitor. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Kit turned to her companion, more than a little worried about how she would react to sleeping under the same roof with a former officer in the Union army. “Why don’t you lie down until supper, Miss Dolly? You’ve had a long day.”

  “I think I will, you sweet darlin’.” Miss Dolly patted Kit’s arm. “I want to look my best this evening. I only hope the gentlemen won’t talk about politics all through dinner. With General Beauregard in command at Charleston, I’m sure none of us need to worry about those murderous Yankees.”

  Kit gave Miss Dolly a gentle prod toward the bewildered maid. “I’ll look in on you before dinner.”

  After
they disappeared upstairs, Kit finally had time to take in her surroundings. The wooden floor shone with polish, and an arrangement of spring flowers sat on the hall table. She remembered how Rosemary’s slovenliness had galled Sophronia.

  She crossed the hall and entered the front sitting room. The freshly painted ivory walls and apple-green moldings were spare and cool, and new, yellow silk taffeta curtains rippled in the breeze from the open windows. The furniture, however, was the comfortable hodgepodge Kit remembered, although the chairs and settees had been reupholstered, and the room smelled of lemon oil and beeswax instead of mildew. Tarnish no longer marred the silver candlesticks, and the grandfather’s clock was working for the first time in Kit’s memory. The mellow, rhythmic ticking should have relaxed her, but it didn’t. Sophronia had done her job too well. Kit felt like a stranger in her own home.

  Cain watched Vandal, his new chestnut, being led into the stable. He was a good horse, but Magnus was mad as hell that Cain had gotten rid of Apollo to buy him. Unlike Magnus, Cain didn’t let himself get attached to any of the horses. He’d learned as a child not to get attached to anything.

  As he strode from the stable toward the house, he found himself thinking about all he’d accomplished in three years. Despite the problems of living in a conquered land with neighbors who shunned him, he hadn’t once regretted his decision to sell his house in New York and come to Risen Glory. He’d had a little experience growing cotton in Texas before the war, and Magnus had been raised on a cotton plantation. With the help of a healthy supply of agricultural pamphlets, the two of them had managed to produce a paying crop last year.

  Cain didn’t pretend to feel a deep affinity for the land, just as he didn’t get sentimental over the animals, but he was enjoying the challenge of restoring Risen Glory. Building the new spinning mill on the northeast corner of the plantation was more fulfilling to him.