Receive Me Falling (21 page)

Mrs. Hall and her daughters stood in the foyer to
greet the guests.
    

“Miss Dall!” exclaimed Mrs. Hall.
 
“We were just saying how delighted we are
that you could join us this evening.”

           
“Thank you for your invitation, Mrs.
Hall.”
  

           
“You are an absolute vision!”

           
“I could not agree more,” said
Edward Ewing as he entered the room.
 
The
Hall girls looked at one another with wide eyes and wilted in their
posture.
 
The entire company greeted one
another and settled into obligatory conversations on weather and other small
matters.
 

As the guests talked, Catherine slipped quietly
onto the balcony off the parlor. She had dressed that evening in a pale blue
dinner gown that rustled over the floor, giving her the appearance of an
apparition.
 
If one had seen her on the
balcony in the moonlight she would have seemed to be a ghost.
 

Mrs. Hall and her daughters had not noticed
Catherine on the balcony and stood just inside gossiping.
   

“I have heard that Mr. Ewing is seriously
beginning to focus his search for a wife,” said Mrs. Hall.
 
“You girls are a bit young, but your beauty
and charming personalities should recommend you for eligibility.”

           
“Oh Mother, please,” said Fanny, the
eldest. “Catherine is surely the object of Mr. Ewing’s affections.”

           
“I urged your father not to invite
the Dalls.
 
Edward Ewing doesn’t need any
more exposure to Catherine.
 
It’s
scandalous the way she carries on with her slaves and that Leah—as if Leah were
a right and proper member of society.”

           
“With all that time Catherine spends
outdoors, her skin is as dark as a nigger,” remarked Lucy.

           
Fanny and Mrs. Hall sucked in their
breath.

           
“Lucy, you are a lady.
 
Negro will certainly do.”

           
Burning with anger, Catherine
stepped out from behind the curtain on the balcony.
 
The Hall women were horrified and Catherine’s
glare did nothing to reassure them that they hadn’t been heard.
 

Mrs. Hall announced dinner in a weak voice, and
led her daughters to the dining room as quickly as she could.
 
Edward was as delighted as Catherine was
disappointed to find their places next to one another.
 

“You’re red in the face beyond the usual scorch of
the sun,” said Edward.
 
“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

Edward leaned close to Catherine’s ear.

“The Halls are insufferable, are they not?”

Catherine closed her eyes and shook her head.

“You sulk the same way at our dinner parties.
 
I hope you don’t find my father and me as
miserable as the Halls.”

“That’s a different kind of misery.”

First Edward laughed, but then he grew quiet for
the rest of the meal.
 
Catherine could
almost hear him trying to think of a way to turn the conversation in his
favor.
 
When dinner concluded, they all
retired to the music room as the Hall sisters attempted to entertain their
guests with their musical endeavors.

           
Edward sat next to Catherine and again
whispered in her ear, “I had thought the music of the bellfrogs to be quite
sufficient for the evening.”

           
Catherine grinned in spite of
herself.
 
Edward appeared pleased at
having elicited a smile, and basked in the glory of his achievement for several
moments.

           
“And after so heavy a meal, I fear
this will quite do me in,” he said.

           
Catherine smiled more broadly and
gave him a reproachful look.
 
At the
conclusion of the song she said, “The only thing that could make this
performance more perfect than it already is would be if some male accompaniment
were added.
 
I think we would all be
delighted to hear Mr. Edward Ewing in concert with the Misses Hall.”

           
Mrs. Hall jumped out of her chair.

           
“A more splendid suggestion could
not have been made. Oh please, Mr. Ewing, indulge us!” Fanny and Lucy fidgeted
with nervous pleasure as Edward glared at Catherine.

           
After the color left his face he
walked to the pianoforte and suggested a song to Fanny.
 
She and Mrs. Hall exchanged glances as Lucy
began to play
I Have a Silent Sorrow
.
 
Catherine’s smile slowly evaporated as the
song began.
 
Edward’s singing voice was
superb, and the audience could not help but lose itself in the
performance.
 
He stared into Catherine’s
eyes throughout the duration of the song, forcing her to look away.
 
At the culmination of the song, the audience
clapped with enthusiasm.
 
Catherine
nodded in concession at Mr. Ewing.
 
He
bowed back at her and joined the gentlemen.

           
As the evening drew to a close
Catherine wandered to the front terrace.
 
She rested her head on a column and looked out into the blackness,
straining her eyes to see the water.
 

           
“Are you all right?” asked Edward as
he stepped out of the shadows.

           
Catherine looked at him,
startled.
 
“I just need a bit of fresh
air.”

           
“The air is cleansing.”

           
“I must agree with you.”

           
“I know our ancestors came from England, but Nevis
is in our blood.”

           
Catherine looked at Edward and then
back at the horizon.

           
“I know I offend you in some way,”
said Edward.
  
“I can only hope to find
myself in your good graces.
 
We have much
to offer one another.”

           
Catherine was saved a response as
Cecil stumbled out onto the terrace.
 
Edward ran to catch Cecil before he plundered down the great
staircase.
 
He and Catherine helped her
father down to the carriage, and Edward and Thomas lifted Cecil into it.
 

           
“I will be sure to tell the Halls that
you needed to get your father home immediately,” said Edward.
 
“I am sure they will understand.”

           
Catherine nodded and climbed into
the carriage.
 
She glanced back toward
the house and saw Edward standing on the front stairs until she was out of
view.

9

Gwen
Flynn, a student at Florida State
University working on her
doctoral thesis on Benjamin West, could barely contain herself during her phone
call with Meg.
 
Gwen told Meg that she
was flying down on Thursday with one of her professors, art historian Dr. David
Parfitt, who also happened to work for Sotheby’s.
 
They would be able to verify the authenticity
of the work, and guide Meg in the sale of the mural.

           
Meg called Brian and told him as
much as she drove to the Historical Society building.

           
“You’ve gotten a lot accomplished
this week,” said Brian.
 
“If this is what
you’re like on vacation, I’d like to see you at work.”

           
“I’m very motivated.”

           
“I’ll say.”

           
“Will you still love me when I’m
broke?”

           
“I’ll love you more.
 
You won’t have as many distractions.”

           
When Meg had first brought Brian to
meet her parents at their waterfront estate, he had been noticeably
uncomfortable.
 
But Richard and Anne were
warm and welcoming people, so Brian’s unease evaporated.
 
Brian was from a working-class family in Wales.
His father worked coal, his mother was a musician and a poet, and they had
always lived modestly.
 

           
When Meg first visited Brian’s
family home she was in awe of the vast, green, hilly country.
 
She remembered running up to the middle of a
knoll and singing
The Hills are Alive
with the Sound of Music.
Brian had said, “Wrong country, Meg;” as she turned
to face a weathered, tall, smiling woman.
 

           
“Mum, this is Meg.”

           
Meg was appropriately mortified, but
Mrs. Hyer was delighted. The rest of the holiday was spent getting to know the
Hyer clan, drinking at local pubs, exploring the coast, and listening to
music.
 
Meg had surprised Brian for his
birthday while in Wales
by taking him to see his favorite musician, David Gray, at the Cardiff
Arena.
 
They checked out the ruins of Cardiff and Caerphilly
Castles.
 
Brian said he originally intended to propose
there, but thought the Fourth of July in Annapolis
more fitting for his American lass.
 

           
Brian’s parents were smitten with
Meg.
 
His father, though much quieter
than his mother, was more pleased with Meg than he had intended to be.
 
He had gotten over his son not taking a Welsh
girl as soon as he heard what Meg had said about Brian’s accent upon their
first meeting.

           
Meg thought of her trip to Wales as she drove to the Historical Society
Museum with the diary
double-bagged on the seat beside her.
 
She
glanced at it every few minutes to verify its existence, and nearly ran off the
road when it fell to the floor after she drove over a rut.
 
Meg scarcely put the jeep in park before
grabbing the diary and racing into the Museum.
 
Drew looked up with surprise as Meg charged through the door.

           
“I was just about to call you,
Meg.
 
I found something of importance.”

           
“Me too.
 
You first.”

           
“In our archived letters I came
across something from a Miss Fanny Hall to a Miss Eugenia Darrow of Darrow
Hall.
 
Darrow Hall was a plantation on
the windward side of the island.
 
Catherine Dall is mentioned by name in the letter.
 
Here.”

           
Meg took the letter and began to
read it aloud.

           
           
           
           
           
           
           
           
23 January 1831

My Dearest Cousin Eugenia:
  
           
           
           
Last
night a fire engulfed our mills, destroying the entire sugar industry of our
plantation.
 
Father says we are ruined
and Mother is beside herself.
 
I scarcely
know what to think.
 
Three slaves died
fighting the blaze, but mercifully we lost no others. I overheard Father
discussing the slaves’ unruly behavior since the incident.
 
Since there is no way to process the cane, it
is rotting on its stalks while the slaves carouse as if they were free men and
women.
 
We are all forced to sleep with
muskets at our sides, in fear for our own safety.
 
Father is irate because he thinks this is
either the work of an angry neighboring small farmer, or abolitionists.
 
The blaze started in three different buildings—not
at all accidental.

I’ve overheard rumblings of Father selling out to
the Ewings of Goldenrise, but he is angered over the price they’ve offered, so
I’ve no idea if that will take place.
 
In
any case we will be forced to move to England.

Mother said she will be glad to remove herself
from this island, but I was born here and know nothing else.
 
I’ve no interest in becoming a pauper in a
foreign place with a cold, rainy climate.
 
We wouldn’t even be allowed slaves in England as they have been banned
there.

You’d be interested to know that Catherine Dall
was here last night.
 
She organized the
slaves to help care for the wounded while Lucy and I served refreshments.
 
No doubt she made herself useful to appeal to
Edward Ewing.
 
Catherine is not getting
any younger and probably can’t wait to find a husband.
 
I wish I could say that Edward did not notice
her, but that was not the case.
 

I will write to you as soon as I know our
fate.
 
Give our love to Sissy and
Auntie.
 
  
           
           
           
           
           
           

 
          
           
           
           
Yours,

           
           
           
           
Fanny Hall

     
     
“Fanny
sounds envious of Catherine,” said Meg.
 
“I
wonder whatever became of Edward Ewing?”

           
“I wondered the same thing,” said
Drew.
 
“I checked the parish records and
found that a Bartholomew Ewing of Goldenrise—presumably Edward’s father—died of
bleeding fever in February of 1831—there was some sort of epidemic.
 
Then in March, there was this entry. ”

           
Meg looked down at the weathered,
yellow page.
 
“Edward Ewing married Fanny
Hall, March of 1831.
  
I suppose Edward
found a good way to acquire the Hall’s destroyed estate.”

           
“Marry their daughter.”

           
“The name Edward Ewing is nagging at
me,” said Meg.
 
“It sounds so
familiar.
 
Was he famous for something?”

           
“Not that I’m aware of,” said Drew.
 
“He was involved politically on the island,
but I don’t think he had any other fame.”

           
“It will come to me.
 
In the meantime, I found this in an upstairs
room of Eden.
 
I think it belonged to Catherine’s
mother.
 
It’s a diary.”

           
Drew carefully opened the bags and
slid the diary onto his desk.
 
He turned
the pages, scanning the entries and shaking his head.
 

           
“Meg, this is an extremely
significant artifact.
 
There is
information in here on daily plantation life, home construction, and the
personal lives of the plantation’s inhabitants.”

           
“I want to donate it to the
Historical Society.”

           
Drew was speechless.

           
Meg went on.
 
“I found this stuffed in some old sheet music
on the first day that I went in the house.”

           
Drew looked at the abolitionist
pamphlet.

           
“There’s a note inside from a James
Silwell to Catherine Dall.
 
We’ve got to
find out more about James Silwell.
 
I
think we’re on the verge of finding something big.”

           
“It does seem as if this story wants
to be known,” said Drew.

           
“Maybe that will quiet the ghosts,”
said Meg.

           
“You don’t believe in ghosts.”

Meg
went back to the villa and made a
Golden
Friendship
rum drink.
 
She thought of
the evidence they’d found and tried to make connections.
 

     
      
Edward Ewing married Fanny Hall and grew
his estate.
 
Abolitionists may have
started the blaze.
 
Catherine, a slave
owner’s daughter, received an abolitionist pamphlet.
 
Esther the slave became mysteriously pregnant
and had a baby girl the same time Catherine’s mother was pregnant and had
Catherine.
  
The girls would have been
close if they grew up at the same time and Esther was a house slave.
 
A slave girl allegedly killed herself by
jumping off the cliff.
 

           
Meg’s cell phone rang.
 

           
“It’s Drew.
 
I missed something.”

           
“What?”

           
“I turned the page in the tax
records.
 
Edward Ewing and Fanny Hall
must have purchased Eden.
 
I don’t know what happened to Catherine and
Cecil, but Edward and Fanny’s names are listed with the house in June 1831.”

           
“Edward Ewing came into all that
land.
 
He must have made a fortune!”

           
“Not only that.
 
I looked back in the parish records.
 
Edward and Fanny baptized Bartholomew James
in September of 1832.”

           
The line grew quiet as the
realization suddenly dawned on Meg.

           
“I’m a descendent of Edward and
Fanny Ewing,” she said.

           
“It would appear that way.”

           
“That’s why his name sounds
familiar.
 
The family bible.
 
I must have seen the Ewing
name in it.”

           
Meg suddenly felt very sick.
 
It was difficult knowing with certainty that
her family fortune was founded in slavery and her father’s theft.
 
It felt like everything she owned didn’t
truly belong to her.
 
Meg knew she had
nothing to do with the decision of her forbearers, but it didn’t change the
fact that she was responsible for the future of her assets.