Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances (95 page)

There must be some mistake. She would drive up the path to the house and Aunt Vicky would come across the lawn and scold her. “Whatever
took
you so long?”

The sky had turned slatey and, an hour ago, with mackerel clouds scudding swiftly, the day had darkened. Now the downpour started, first just a few fat drops and then, like a cloudburst, an inundation. The trees bowed in the wind and the road was slippery. The windshield wipers swished back and forth, the car became steamy in the summer heat. She missed the turn-off at Roundsville, had to go back.
I
need this like a hole in the head
, she thought, tightly, and then saw the tiny Main Street of Cranford just up ahead.

It really got to her then. Cranford meant a woman who had been everything to her in her formative years. If that woman was really dead nothing would ever be the same again. These familiar shops and stores: Elliott’s Pharmacy, where they called her Margie, where for as long as she could remember, Bennie the soda clerk had brazenly dropped in two scoops for the price of one. The Post Office, where Sam Clive had instructed her in local history. The newspaper building, modest and one-storied, where Cletus Brown had given her her first smell of printer’s ink.

She passed through the miniscule village and headed for Horseneck Lane, at the top of which the great old mansion stood high on a hill. And at that moment the heavens opened. There were now sheets of rain, so torrential that it was impossible to navigate a car. There was nothing to do but stop and wait, mopping her damp forehead. The rain came down in a blinding sheet, and she lit a cigarette, half out of her mind. Why must she sit here and
wait
… must
everything
go against her? So near and yet so far …

She drummed her fingers on the dashboard. “Will you stop this damned, infernal
rain?
” she cried, and ground her cigarette out in the tray. “I do not choose to be a prisoner, sitting here waiting, waiting.

“I do not choose …” she said viciously, and at a break in the downpour drove on again. A quarter of a mile later she was at the entrance to the estate. From here one could see the house, outlined against the sky, standing like a fortress, surrounded by its tall pines. There was nothing else on that hill, only that great old house, red Georgian brick.

It was a spectacular sight, awesome really. It could be a beautiful sight, when the sun hit the soft pink-red brick, the slender, shuttered windows, the three jutting dormers below the mansard roof and the two high chimneys at either end.

Or it could seem forbidding, as it did today, standing alone in the lashing rain, its brick turned the color of clotted blood. It was the first time Margo had thought of it in those terms but, staring up, she wanted to turn around and leave it in the distance. Because it seemed, suddenly, empty and forsaken, a ghost house. Dominating the landscape, it looked cruel and hard, timeless and impersonal, wicked, even. It seemed to say that no matter what person died and left its old walls, that was of no import, that time and tide made no mark on it, that it belonged to the ages and would stand, outlined against the sky, forever.

I don’t want to go in there
, Margo thought, chilled. She didn’t want to drive the short distance left and go inside. She had never thought of it as a heartless house, but she did now. She cut the motor and stared. The great portico, with its Ionic columns, was severe and classic, and in this driving rain it was almost impossible to picture people strolling back and forth on the stone veranda, women in silken dresses and the scent of gardenia and
muguet des bois
, or men in smart morning clothes with spanking white ascots. Summer parties, and gardens adorned with Japanese lanterns, voices laughing.

There had been all that, but it was as if her imagination only led her to believe it. The rain swept over the green grass and the trees bowed in the wind. The house was dead, she decided, just a cold, elegant stone edifice without a heart. It belonged to history and to the ages, was almost as old as the country itself. She heard her aunt’s voice.

“A band of English pioneers in 1659, following the lordly Hudson upstream in search of fertile lands, paused when they reached a place where the river seemed to linger to embrace the Sterling intervale. One of these men was an ancestor of mine, William Gaylord Brand, and upon this site he erected a small farmhouse and barn. It was more than fifteen years later that, prospering, he started to build the present house, Brand Manor, and in the year 1674 installed his wife, his sons and daughters and his household pets in this lovely Georgian home. In the family archives is a “true copy” of his will in his fine copperplate hand:
I
do make and ordain my eldest son Aaron and my youngest son Noah to be sole Executors of my last Will and Testament, confiding in their faithfulness, and desiring them and all the rest of my Loving Children to study Peace and Live in Love and Unity, and the God of Peace be with you.”

That tall, handsome woman, leading the way as she showed paying members of the New York State Historical Society through the house. “This cherry highboy was brought from Salem by Abigail Summers as part of her dowry. Note the Queen Anne legs. The portraits on the left of the hall are of Lucinda Phelps, from Greenfield, the bride of Nathaniel Brand, and the young son of that issue, James Lincoln Brand, my father.”

There was a flash of lightning, a roll of thunder, and then the heavens opened again. The house itself was obscured by the storm. Putting the car into gear again Margo zoomed up the graveled driveway, squinting against the rain, and parked just outside the columned veranda. As she climbed out of the little Impala a jagged streak of lightning yellowed the sky, and the old house stood out in bold relief, beautiful, stern, wonderfully proportioned, graceful in its stark setting, as impregnable as any citadel. She dashed across the lawn and up the stone steps, shaking herself as she reached the entrance door, with its exquisite fanlight. Trembling, she stood there, unwilling to press the bell. Unwilling …

Because the hand which opened that door would not, could not be the hand of Victoria Brand. That hand was stilled forever. Margo would never lay eyes on that sweet face again, or rest her head on that comforting shoulder, or confide in that listening ear.

She’s dead
, Margo thought,
she’s dead. I can’t believe it, but she’s dead.
There was an apocalyptic crash of thunder and she quickly put her hand on the doorbell.
I
was too late
, she thought, despairing.
While I was house-hunting and looking for a job, Aunt Vicky died.

And she would never forgive herself.

Too little and too late.

The person who answered her ring was Pompey, her aunt’s butler, houseman, chief cook, and bottle washer. “So it’s you at last,” he said, trying for a cheery smile. “Some day, ain’t it? Come in quick, come in and dry off.”

“Pompey, is it true?”

“You heard about it?”

“I stopped off at Dalton for a drink. The owner of the place said — ”

“She died last Tuesday, Miss Margo. We tried to get ahold of you, didn’t know where you were, though.”

“I’m glad
you
didn’t have to tell me,” she said. “You must have been dreading that.”

“Was I
ever
,” he said. “First thing I thought of every morning … how’m I going to tell that girl?” He shook his head. “Pictured you flying in here, all smiles and laughing and calling for her, ‘Where are you, Aunt Vicky, I’m here …’ “ He cleared his throat and yanked open the door. “I’ll get your bags and then fix you a drink.”

“I’ll help you with the bags.”

“You ain’t going out in that rain again.” He spanked her lightly on her bottom and dashed out. She stood in the airy, gracious entrance hall, every detail of which was drawn indelibly on her mind … the maple chests, golden in color even on this dark day, flanking the two opposite walls, the portraits of Brand ancestors, the Georgian mirror and the bull’s-eye mirror, the delicate little Queen Anne table with a pewter tray for calling cards.

The central staircase, an unusual feature for a house of this period, had forty steps due to the height of the ceilings on the ground floor. She used to slide down one banister and then the other, saying, “Geronimo!”

She was alone and unheard, and she whispered what Pompey had pictured her calling out, what indeed she would have called out if she hadn’t stopped off in Dalton for that drink, if she hadn’t heard the news beforehand.

“I’m here, Aunt Vicky, I’m here. Where are you, I’m here …”

But there was no answering voice. There was no sound at all except for that of the door banging shut as the wind caught it, and Pompey kicking at it to be let in. He was soaked to the skin, his shirt clinging to his chest. “Whew,” he said, dropping the bags. “This beats all, this rain today.”

He wiped his streaming head with a handkerchief. “Now I make us a drink.”

“Take your shirt off,” she ordered. “I’m of age, don’t worry about me. Get that wet thing off you.”

“Nothing much to see anyway,” he said, shedding the dripping garment. “An old man’s body.”

“You’ve scarcely changed at all,” she protested, and it was true. He was lean and fit, no protruding belly, and his hair had been gray when she had last seen him. It was still threaded with black. He was a strong, tall man who had worked hard all his life, the son of a man whose father had been a slave. He was a magnificent old man. They sat and drank, close to each other on a camel-back sofa. He had been liberal with the gin: the drinks were potent, therapeutic. She began to relax, actually heard her own released sigh. “Feeling better?” Pompey asked, watching her face.

“Yes, quite a bit better.”

“Still can’t believe it, can you? Me neither. I wake up and think, Pompey, you’re an old guy, you must be dreaming things. I imagine I have a nightmare. And then I pinch myself and it hurts, so I know I ain’t dreaming. She’s gone. And me? I ain’t got nowhere to go, Miss Margo.”

“But she did leave you money?” Margo asked anxiously.

“Yes, enough for the few years I got to go. Besides some savings. It’s just … this is where I been living for thirty years. It’s home.”

“I know.” She put a hand on his knee. “What about John?”

“Broke up. Oh, sure. Anyway, he’s doing well, working for Jim Bach, the lawyer man. Jim’s old, Johnnie’ll take over when Jim meets his Maker. No need to worry, he’s up and coming.”

“Douglas?”

“Farming. Different as night from day. ‘Cept for their looks, not like twins at all. Different peas from the same pod.”

She thought back. The twin boys had been ten when their mother died. The father, a farmer, had turned to drink. His liver had finally taken him off and then Victoria Brand had brought them into her home. Never married, childless, she had reared them, sent John to law school and Doug to agricultural college. When Doug graduated, she’d bought a parcel of land for him, but John lived on in the house.

Once, years ago, they had been like a family. Every June until September, they had lived together like siblings, spent day after golden day together. The twins were five years older than herself; she had thought them very grand and grown-up. And Pompey was right, they had been of disparate temperaments. John, his nose in a book, Doug the “wild” one, always getting into scrapes.

Those long, magical summers …

Cut short when she had been sent abroad for study. She hadn’t kept a diary, like many of the other girls. She had, instead, written regularly to Aunt Vicky, as had her aunt to her, so that although they had been separated by the miles, each knew the most minute details and particulars of the other’s life. Victoria Brand had been the
eminence grise
for a lonely young girl, her advice and counsel taking the place of a family situation. To her parents, she had dashed off charming, witty little notes and
billets
, but to Victoria Brand she had bared her very soul.

“If I could have seen her just once more,” she said, and choked up.

“She sure did love you, that’s for certain,” Pompey said, putting his arm around her. “She saved all your letters, all of them letters are lying there in the eskritor in her room.”

The little escritoire, a museum piece in itself, dainty, finely-wrought, with the funny little secret drawer that had so fascinated her. There her aunt had sat down, in her crisp, businesslike fashion, and written her letters to Switzerland.
Dear Margo …

All those lost years.

“She didn’t suffer, did she, Pompey?”

“Went quick, just like that. Don’t think about it, because she must of went real quick.”

“Her heart?”

“Seems like. She was getting on, after all. We’ll talk about it another time. I’ll take you upstairs to your room now, your old room. Maybe you want a nap, get some rest, how about that, dearie?”

“I won’t go up yet. You want to start dinner, don’t you? I’ll help with it. I’ll make a salad, and I can do a very good dressing for it. I just don’t want to go up yet.”

“Best way to take something in stride, keep yourself busy,” he agreed. “Let’s go in the kitchen and start the fixings.”

• • •

They gossiped, the rain a counterpoint to their voices. Pompey insisted on being filled in on her schooling and life abroad. In “Yurrup,” as he termed it. “Was the girls nice?”

“Some of them. It was a rather snobby school, you understand. However, the academic standing was high, you can generally count on European schools for that. When I graduated, I went to Paris and studied photography under a pupil of Cartier-Bresson’s. I have samples of my work, and the
atelier
where I studied in Paris will give me entree to some reputable galleries here. I was trying to find work, and an apartment when … when she died. I’d called her saying I’d be here this week. She sounded hale and hearty, she sounded her old self. Oh, if only I’d come right away …”

“Could be just as well,” he said. “Not to see her like that. You remember her the way she always was, not like that.”