Wilde, Jennifer (60 page)

"I'm
going to miss you, luv," she said quietly.

"I'll
miss you, too, Angie."

"We'll
write."

"Of
course we will."

"And—you're
going to be happy, Marietta. I feel it in my bones."

"Happiness
no longer concerns me."

"It'll
come, though. Eventually. Just like it came to me."

"Perhaps,"
I said dryly.

Kyle
returned a short while later, bringing cheese and bread and fish with him. We
ate in the sitting room, on the floor, candles burning in old chipped saucers.
Although we tried to make it a light, festive affair, a pall hung over us. The
empty rooms all around seemed to echo with ghostly voices. Kyle sat with his
arm draped around Angie's shoulder, as grim and solemn as ever. I knew he blamed
me for Jeff's death—that he had never approved of me—yet he had done all he
could to help me these last weeks.

"I
suppose I'd better take the trunks down now," he said after we finished
the scanty meal. "We'll need to get an early start. Your boat leaves at
seven, I believe?"

"That's
right."

"I've
already made arrangements with young Blake. He'll bring a carriage around at
five-thirty. We'll strap your trunks on top and return for ours after you've
gone."

"You've
gotten us a room at the inn?" Angie inquired.

Kyle
nodded, getting to his feet. In the empty room he seemed even larger than
usual. The flickering candles on the floor cast a long shadow across the wall.
Angie and I cleared up the things, and after Kyle had carried all of the trunks
down to the hall, they retired to their room.

In
my nightgown, I folded the clothes I had been wearing and packed them in the
valise along with my toilet articles. I blew out the candle and climbed into
bed, knowing I would toss and turn for hours, just as I had done every night
for the past three weeks.

I
was up at five o'clock, dressing. Angie came in with a cup of steaming coffee
she'd made down in the deserted kitchen. I could tell that she hadn't slept
well, either. She was fully dressed, ready to leave, and she stayed with me,
trying valiantly to be cheerful. We heard the carriage coming down the street.
I picked up the valise, and we went downstairs where Kyle was waiting. In a matter
of minutes the trunks were strapped on top of the carriage and we were on our
way. A sleepy Teddy Blake drove us down the still dark streets toward the
docks.

Kyle
handled everything once we arrived. He saw to my berth, saw that my trunks were
safely stored on board. The sun was just beginning to come up, staining the sky
with orange. The ship was brown, as were the docks, the great Mississippi a
dark, dark blue spangled with flecks of gold as the sun touched it. There was
very little fog. It was going to be a clear day. Angie and I stood watching
passengers going up the gangplank. She held my hand in a crushing grip, and
just before Kyle joined us, she pulled me to her and gave me a mighty hug.
There were tears in her eyes.

"Goodbye,
luv," she whispered.

"Goodbye,
Angie."

"I'll
never forget you, Marietta."

"Nor
I you. Be happy with Kyle."

She
sobbed and turned me loose. I was thankful for Kyle's arrival, afraid I might
break down myself. I kissed her cheek and shook his hand. Then, tearing myself
from them, I climbed the wooden gangplank just before they raised it. I stood
on deck, holding onto the railing as the ship pulled slowly away. Kyle's arm
was around Angie's shoulder again, and she was still crying. The sunlight was
brighter now. I could see her tears glistening. She took out her handkerchief
and waved it as greater and greater distance separated us. I waved back, filled
with tremulous emotions I could no longer contain.

I
waved goodbye to Angie, and to Jeff, and to all that had been. Tears welled up
in my eyes, spilled down my cheeks despite my efforts to stem the flow. It was
the first time I had cried since the day Jeff had died. It would be the last.
Angie and Kyle were small specks on the dock now as the ponderous ship started
slowly up the river. Angie waved her handkerchief one last time. I returned the
wave, and then I brushed the tears from my eyes and turned away. That part of
my life was over for good. I wondered what the future held in store.

It
was Sunday afternoon. I sat downstairs in the tiny office back of the shop, the
heavy ledger opened on the desk in front of me. Going over the columns of
figures slowly and carefully, I knew it was no longer possible to deny the
obvious. The facts were there, neatly recorded on the pages in black ink. The
expenditures had been heavy, the profits small. I had done little more than
break even.

I
closed the ledger with a sense of finality and put it away. I wasn't in debt,
but almost all the money was gone, and I knew there would be very little coming
in. Oh, I could make a living from the shop. If I went on working my fingers to
the bone six days a week, I would continue to come out each month with some
small profit, enough to live on. But after six long months I had to admit to
myself that the shop was never going to be the success I had envisioned.

I
knew that, and I knew why.

A
ray of sunlight streamed through the window gilding the grainy leather pad and
making a tiny silver sunburst on the black ink pot. I could go on sewing gaudy
gowns for the prostitutes of Natchez-under-the-hill and sensible, serviceable
garments for those friendly, hard-working women who were trying to establish
roots for their families here in the unofficial fourteenth colony. But those
affluent women who provided the very life blood for a business such as mine
would continue to stay away.

Natchez
wasn't New Orleans. It was a thriving, bustling British colony with carefully
structured social levels. Thousands of people had poured into the isolated
frontier settlement as the turmoil between rebels and Royalists took on
impetus. Staunchly loyal families left the thirteen colonies bag and baggage to
establish homes far away from the tense conflict that everyone predicted would
soon erupt into an all-out revolution. A number of the families were quite
wealthy, many with aristocratic connections back in England. They brought their
wealth with them, and their rigid class consciousness. The women who could have
made the shop a success had their own seamstresses, dowdy, aging spinsters who
made a precarious living trotting from fine house to fine house in a desperate
effort to please the grand dames and their spoiled, pampered daughters. They
would have nothing to do with the scarlet woman from New Orleans.

My
reputation had proceeded me. Somehow or other, these snobbish, self-satisfied
women had learned that I had been hostess of a gambling house. It might as well
have been a brothel as far as they were concerned. Morals in Natchez were as
lax as anywhere else, illicit affairs rampant, but it was all concealed behind
a solid wall of hypocrisy. There was no demimonde society in Natchez. There
were the good citizens who lived on the hill and the dreadful social lepers who
caroused in the taverns and brothels under-the-hill. Class distinctions were
sharp, and the upper-class ladies had decided not to patronize my shop.

I
smiled bitterly, remembering the early enthusiasm that had caused me to pour
all my time, energy, and money into the place. My shop was in a small white
frame building at the end of one of the main business streets, almost on the
outskirts of town. A white picket fence enclosed the small yard, and three tall
elm trees grew in front. My living quarters were on the second floor, above the
shop, and I could see the Mississippi River from my bedroom windows. Convinced
smart ladies would soon be pouring in, I had hired two young assistants,
bright, merry girls who had been as eager as I to make the place a success. One
of them had to be let go after the first two months, and I was forced to
dismiss the second last month. There simply wasn't enough business to justify
full-time assistants.

Though
my lease on the place was for a year, I seriously doubted that I would be able
to survive another six months. I could make a living, but merely making a
living wasn't enough. It was time to admit defeat and move on to something
else. I didn't plan to grow old making inexpensive, durable garments for
middle-class matrons and spectacular gowns for prostitutes. Even if the shop
was a failure, it had served its purpose. It had helped me over a very
difficult period, and it had taught me a lesson about social power.

The
sunlight wavered on the desktop. Outside, the elm trees stirred in the breeze.
The shop was silent. The bitter smile still played on my lips. I had come to
Natchez to make a new start, to put my past behind me. I was going to become a
respectable business woman. My shop would be the best of its kind in the whole
territory, my conduct above reproach. I was going to make my own way, using the
ability I knew I had. But the fine ladies of Natchez wouldn't allow me to make
a new start. They had labeled me a scarlet woman from the beginning and had
wrecked any chance of my success.

I
tried not to resent it, but I did. I wanted to strike back at those
self-satisfied, hypocritical dames. I wanted to
show
them. I would, too.
Somehow or other I would make them come around. The shop was a failure, but
they hadn't defeated
me.
I was going to fight back. A plan had already
begun to take shape in my mind. It was utterly mercenary, and I didn't know
whether I could go through with it or not. One thing was certain: I no longer
intended to be a victim, passive, acted upon. I was going to take matters into
my own hands.

Leaving
the office, I went up the back stairs to my bedroom. It was after two o'clock.
Bruce Trevelyan would be coming to take me for a ride in his carriage shortly
before three. We had gone for a ride almost every Sunday for the past two
months. Bruce was twenty-two years old, a tall, slender young man with wavy
brown hair and serious blue eyes. The Trevelyans had been among the first
Royalist families to move to Natchez. Brace's father was the second son of a
duke, his plantation already one of the largest in the territory. His
background, wealth and clean-cut good looks made Bruce easily the most eligible
bachelor around. He was polite and formal and rather grave, and I feared that
he was very much in love with me.

Apparently
unaware that it was off limits to the respectable upper class, he had come into
the shop two months ago to purchase a birthday present for his sister Cynthia.
His elegant clothes and reserved manner immediately identified him as a member
of the gentry. He looked bewildered by all the frills and fripperies
surrounding him. Clearly at a loss, he smiled politely and silently beseeched
me for assistance. I was touched by his youth, his vulnerability, the warmth of
that polite smile. After suggesting a number of gifts, I sold him a lovely shawl.
He thanked me and left, and I forgot about him. So, when he returned the
following Sunday to inquire if I would care to go for a ride in his new
carriage, I was completely taken by surprise.

I
had hesitated, of course. Although he really wasn't a great deal younger than
I, he was a mere youth by my standards. I thanked him for the invitation,
intending to refuse, but in the end I hadn't the heart. I found his nervous
uncertainty and youthful gravity quite endearing. Bruce proved to be a charming
companion, and while I realized our weekly drives were causing a furor of
gossip, I also realized that such gossip couldn't matter less to me at this
point. Bruce was determined. He had told his parents that he was twenty-two
years old and could see whomever he chose, adding that he didn't give a hang
what people said. My reputation as an adventuress was considerably enhanced,
but, while I firmly refused to see Bruce during the week, I saw no reason to
give up these innocent Sunday drives.

The
white curtains in my bedroom billowed inward with the breeze, and I stared
glumly at the worn gray carpet with its blue and rose patterns. The room was
small and inexpensively furnished, as was the sitting room adjoining it. At
first these rooms had been a snug haven, comforting me in my grief, but
recently, as my loneliness and dissatisfaction grew, I had found them
confining, almost prison-like. They seemed to symbolize my failure. I had never
spent a happy night in that large brass bed with its dark rose coverlet. The first
two or three months I had been unable to sleep peacefully because of my grief,
and then, when that was finally under control, I began to worry about the shop.
Nights of angry frustration followed the nights of grief, and always there was
the loneliness that grew stronger, more tormenting, as the weeks passed. Had I
not been so lonely, had I not been starved for some kind of social contact, I
would never have accepted Bruce's invitation in the first place.

Still,
I enjoyed the rides tremendously, enjoyed the fresh air, the gentle rock of the
carriage as the horses moved along at a leisurely pace. It soothed me seeing
the countryside, so lovely and verdant. And I could forget my problems for a
while, in the company of the grave, polite young man who was so serious and
earnest and endearing, who talked about his childhood in England, about books
and music and life and what he hoped to accomplish. It was casual and relaxing
and innocent, until I realized that Bruce was falling in love with me. I had
not encouraged him, yet last time, when he stopped the carriage on the river
road and pulled me into his arms, I hadn't protested, nor had I pulled away.