Deceptions (8 page)

How do you know? a small voice asked. Have you asked her if she needs you?

Judge Fairfax began to speak and Stephanie pushed away her thoughts and her guilt. She only had time to think how amazing it was that just when she and Sabrina were farthest apart she had found Garth to love her, and then she concentrated on becoming his wife.

Chapter 5

The castle rose up from the green hills of Hampshire, its battlements and towers worn by the centuries to a pale gray, its windows cut deep into stone walls. Beyond, a forest of copper beeches loomed, like a gleaming bronze curtain rustling in the June breeze.

Treveston Castle,' Stephanie read in awestruck tones from Sabrina's letter. 'Eighty rooms, twelve hundred acres of farms and parks ... Garth, look!' she cned, glancing up. Peacocks!'

Garth slowed the car and looked at the two peacocks, the castle and the silver-blue lake that curved behind it, taking in what was once the moat. 'A cozy cottage,' he said

ironically, but in spite of himself he was impressed. Straight out of a fairy tale, he thought; Minnesota farm boys and Midwestern professors have trouble believing such a thing is real. And, of course, it is ridiculous; it doesn't belong in the twentieth century. But still, it casts a spell: magnificent, beautifully proportioned, larger than Ufe.

'Can you imagine Sabrina living here after the wedding?' Stephanie asked. 'I'd feel... dwarfed. As if I'd intruded in a house built for giants. I don't know how she'll do it.'

* Ask her,' Garth suggested, and stopped the car as a servant came up to open the doors and take their luggage inside.

Stephanie brouglit it up later as they took a tour of the grounds. 'I think about the people,' Sabrina said, 'Not four hundred years of wars and knights and royal processions, but the family. Especially the black sheep.'

The three of them walked on paths that wound among a thousand rose bushes as Sabrina told stories of the black sheep of the Longworth family. 'I think they invented one every generation, partly to liven things up, but mainly so they could be as eccentric as they Uked and still have someone more disgraceful to point to.*

Stephanie laughed. 'Is there one now?'

'Not that I know of. I think Denton would like to be one, but his father and the board of directors frown on publicity, much less scandal.'

*I didn't know he worked. How does he- and have so much time to travel and be with you?'

'He works when the mood strikes. It seems he has a system

They walked on, talking, as Garth lingered behind, turning aside to look at the high hedges of the famous Treveston maze.

'Garth, we're going in,' Stephanie called. 'Do you want a tour of the house?'

'I'll catch up to you,' he said. Stephanie had shown him a letter of Sabrina's that described the maze: a triangle two hundred feet long on each side, planted in 1775 by Staunton Longworth in a labyrinth of hedges where visitors could be lost for hours. Garth peered through the opening, pondering geometric patterns Staunton Longworth might have used.

I'll tiy it later, he thought. Or tomonow, after the wedding.

Inside the house, he followed the sound of his wife's voice. But, disconcertingly, he found it was Sabrina who was talking as he met them in the library. Odd, that over the years their voices remained identical even though they lived in different countries.

* ... restored the ceiling,' Sabrina said, gesturing, and Garth began to pay attention, admitting to himself once again that even though it was an anachronism, more museum than home, it was as splendid as anything he had ever seen.

The rooms led one to another in stately grandeur, hugely proportioned and fabulously detailed, from parquetry and carved lintels to muUioned windows framed in ivory damask drapes with fringed velvet ties. The castle dated from 1575, when Sir William Longworth, member of Queen Elizabeth's Privy Council, built it in Treveston Village on land granted him for loyal service. Fifty years later his grandson hired England's greatest architect, Inigo Jones, to remodel the south front and add three state rooms and a Grand Staircase. Other descendants made more additions to a total of eighty rooms, and in the twentieth century the farms and parks were improved, including the addition of a narrow-gauge steam railway crisscrossing the estate.

Shakespeare's troupe entertained in Treveston's Great Hall, and generations of farsighted Longworths filled the castle with a priceless collection of Titians, Rembrandtsand Gainsboroughs, rare books and prints and seventeenth-century tapestries and furniture.

'Of course, you can't just hang a picture or buy a new rug when you want to,' Sabrina told Stephanie later as they sat on the balcony of her sitting room and bedroom. They were having tea while Garth tackled the maze. That's the first rule. But isn't it exciting an3rway?'

*You look so happy,' Stephanie said. *Is it possible for anyone to be as happy as you look?'

They laughed in remembrance. Four years ago, Stephanie thought. Four years of being apart. In that time, while she was settling down in Evanston, Sabrina graduated from the

Sorbonne, moved to London and went to work in Nicholas Blackford's antique gallery on Lowndes Street. She lived alone in a small flat, made new friends, helped organize two charity auctions. And in her letters to Stephanie she never mentioned her feelings. But now she might, Stephanie thought; because suddenly, it was so wonderful being together. She recalled Sabrina's look when they arrived. Love. And gratitude. 'You are happy, aren't you?' she asked.

'Happy or excited,* Sabrina said. *l think with Denton they're the same. He's so incredible - he strolls through the world as if it's one of his Treveston gardens. You can't believe how overwhelming it is.'

'Oh, yes, I can,' Stephanie said diyly, taking in the canopied bed covered with Sabrina's clothes, the maid folding and packing them for the honeymoon, the Regency dressing table and wardrobe, the French doors leading to the balcony where they sat.

'No, it's not money,' Sabrina said. 'I mean, of course the money is wonderful - I've been living beyond my salary ever since I came to London. And it's not that Denton's father is a viscount, though that's part of it. Mostly it's the way Denton assumes he belongs wherever he goes. And he loves me, so by now I'm almost as confident as he is.'

'You don't need Denton to make you confident.'

'But I do, that's the trouble. You know how I've always tried to impress people so they'd like me ... well, look at Mother, how pleased she is with me and my spectacular marriage.'

'Mother didn't need that to love you.'

'Probably not, but have you ever seen her so affection-ate?'

'No,' Stephanie admitted.

But the next day, watching Sabrina after the wedding ceremony, Stephanie thought she had never seen anyone more sure of herself and in command. A queen, she thought. I'll never look like that. Or have a castle. She felt a quick flash of envy, and then it was gone as Sabrina looked her way and their eyes met. I just want her to be happy, she thought.

S4

Sabrina's lips sent her a silent thank-you before Denton nudged her to turn back to the guests in the reception line.

'My dear Sabrina, you have taken London by storm/ the Duchess of Westford said as she reached them. She beamed with the admiration only the very secure give to those younger and more beautiful than themselves, and Sabrina accepted it with a smile, in her gown of white silk and chiffon. Her slender neck rose above the triple strand of pearls and diamonds that was her husband's wedding gift; a matching strand glinunered like stars woven through her dark auburn hair. The duchess kissed her. *I don't blame Iris for capturing you for her son. I wish I'd found you first, for mine.'

'But I captured her, you know,* said Denton. 'Mother only found her. She was looking for a desk and she found Sabrina.'

'She found the desk, too,' Sabrina said gaily. 'I sold it to her and then she invited me to tea.'

'Superb taste,' said Lady Iris Longworth to the duchess. 'Sabrina helped her mother furnish their home in Washington - of course, you've met her father, the under secretary of—?'

*Um,* the duchess nodded, less concerned than her friend Iris with Sabrina's credentials.

'Duchess,' said an impatient voice. 'Can I kiss my old Juliette roommate?' And in a flurry, Gabrielle de Martel moved forward to kiss Sabrina's cheeks. 'You look like a woman who has been swept off your feet by a handsome, debonair world traveler and bon vivant who quite properly adores you and has promised to give you a piece of the world for each birthday and Christmas.'

'If I can't find anything better,' Denton added.

*But what can I give you, then, except the moon?' asked Sabrina.

'Oh, forget the moon. I wanted it once, but now I have you.' He held her hand, and Sabrina smiled at his cheerful round face and rosy cheeks and trim black mustache. His shrewd black eyes were often hard, but when he looked at her they softened and became eager. *I can't really believe even now that you belong to me.'

The line moved on. 'Sabrina, you'll both spend a week with us at Ranstead; do say you will, I'm counting on you. We'll just be a small group, twenty or thirty, so we can really get acquainted.'

*But we expect you at Harleton House in August, Sabrina, don't forget.'

'Sabrina, did Denton tell you we arranged for two weeks at Colbum Abbey in September?'

'Sabrina, have you hired a secretary yet? I can recommend—'

'When will your London house be ready, Sabrina? I've heard such wonderful things about it.'

'Never.'

*1 beg your pardon?'

'We're going to be houseguests for the rest of our lives, swooping down on great homes and castles and perching awhile and then swooping on. We have so many nests to choose from, we don't need our own.'

Iris Longworth tapped her arm, smiling in spite of herself at Sabrina's mischievous eyes. 'You will be criticized if you jest about our friends' inviutions. They take them very seriously.'

Sabrina nodded. 'Thank you.' She knew her voice was not penitent, but at least she hadn't smiled, even though her laughter kept bubbling up because she was having such fun. She looked down the receiving line to catch Stephanie's eye again, but Laura was between them, nodding her approval as she saw Sabrina looking her way. I've given Mother the ultimate antique, Sabrina thought; an in-law with four hundred years of lineage. Gordon was less enthusiastic; he prefened Garth to Denton. 'More solid,' he said, 'more serious.' More like himself, he meant, but he was friendly to Denton, and Sabrina felt she had finally pleased both her parents at once.

And Stephanie? She stepped back to see her: calm, quietly friendly, as six hundred strangers greeted her and commented on her remarkable likeness to her sister. Gabrielle had reported that she was chatting comfortably with some of England's riciiest women about her two babies, life in a Chicago suburb and her husband's latest research grant.

S6

Beyond Stephanie, Sabrina saw Garth watching her with a curiosity he made no effort to hide. She knew what he was thinking and gave a Uttle smile, as if to apologize, before turning back to the guests.

Garth moved back from the receiving line to lean against a window. He was trying to fit his memories of Sabrina with this stunning, vibrant woman, shimmering in the mist of her gown, her warmth and vitality the center around which the party revolved. Where was the cold, distant woman who had attended his wedding four years earlier at Biyn Mawr, and the reserved sister-in-law who had made two brief visits, spent mostly with Stephanie, when their children were bom?

Garth knew he had never met this woman. Either something had transformed her - or the Sabrina he had met in the past had been hiding her true self.

He looked at his wife. In a long, pink dress Sabrina had bought her in Paris, she was softly beautiful, a pastel portrait in the slanting afternoon sunlight. She said she'd gained weight, though Garth had not noticed, and she no longer had the regal posture drilled into them at Juliette, but she outshone every woman there except Sabrina, and she was holding her own with the aristocracy of England. Garth was proud of her.

'Clever man, to escape,' Sabrina said with a low laugh, suddenly beside him. The reception line had wound to an end. 'I wish I'd been able to. Let's get Stephanie and hide somewhere.'

* And your husband?'

'Denton is discussing racing cars; he's investing in one for the Grand Prix. Do you know anything about the Grand Prix? Neither do I. but I have a strong suspicion I will soon learn. For now, though, I deeply desire a hiding place where I may remove my shoes.*

He chuckled as they rescued Stephanie from a plump earl 'who kept talking about spaniels,' Stephanie exclaimed, as they slipped into a small study. 'He said the wedding reminded him of his last dog show!'

They laughed together. Sabrina pulled off her shoes and curled up on the couch with a happy sigh. 'Oh, how I've

missed you. Nobody else always laughs at the same things I do. Stephanie, how can you keep your shoes on? Two hours in that line—I'

At the other end of the couch, Stephanie shook her head ruefully. 'I can't take them off. Not in a castle. I can talk to your lords and ladies and feast at your table, but I cannot take off my shoes. It's all right,* she added quickly.'! think what you have is wonderful. It's just that I'm more comfortable in my own home, I'm happy to say.'

Sabrina relaxed. 'I'm so glad. I was afraid—'

'I'd be jealous?'

'Not exactly. That you'd think I'd grabbed a bigger spotlight.*

'Oh. No, I don't. Isn't that strange? Maybe because I have my own now and I like it.*

'No more being shoved in the shade?*

Stephanie thought about it. 'Seems it*s gone.*

Garth looked at them with patient curiosity. 'A code?* he guessed.

Stephanie started. She'd forgotten he was there. For a minute it had been just her and Sabrina, alone, as they used to be, their thoughts and words weaving together. She tvumed to him. 'Once I told Sabrina her spotlight put me in the shade where no one noticed me.'