You Belong to My Heart (9 page)

Clay knocked at the front fan-lighted doors and waited.

Blowing on his stiff fingers, he stood on one foot, then the other, so cold that he was shivering.

“Why, Mist’ Clay,” said the Prebles’ smiling butler, Titus, throwing the front door open wide. “Come on in here out of the cold ‘fo’ you freeze.”

“Thanks, Titus.” Clay rushed inside. “My respects to Mr. and Mrs. Preble. Is Mary still awake?” He glanced at the grand staircase, shrugged out of his coat, handed it to the butler.

“Miss Mary Ellen awake, sho’ ’nuff, but she’s not here.”

“Not here? It’s after nine o’clock. Where is she?”

“She went with her momma and papa to some fancy Christmas party.”

“Oh.” Clay’s face fell; he couldn’t hide his disappointment. “Where was the party? Who gave it?”

“Land sakes alive, Mist’ Clay,” Titus said, grinning, “I can’t keep up with all them parties and whatnot. Seems like everybody havin’ a party. The Master and Mistress Preble, why, they git so many invitations, can’t count ’em all. Sure do get lots o’ invites.”

“I can imagine.”

“They might be home ‘fo’ long. Why don’t you come on back to the kitchen and let Mattie fix you a cup of chocolate.”

“I don’t think so, Titus.” Clay said. “Thanks all the same, but I guess I better get on home.” He smiled at Titus and added, “I have to work tomorrow, and six
A.M.
comes early.”

“Don’t it, though,” said the butler, shaking his gray head in agreement. “Sure come early when it’s cold and dark outside.”

Coat back on, Clay moved toward the front door. “Tell Mary I came by, will you, Titus?”

“I’ll sure tell that child,” Titus said. “She be mighty sorry she missed you.”

Clay changed his mind. Titus was right. Mary
would
be upset if she knew she’d missed him. So he wouldn’t let her know. He wouldn’t lie about it. He just wouldn’t tell her.

“Titus, never mind.” Clay turned to the servant. “Don’t mention it to Mary, all right? Don’t tell them I was here.”

“No, suh, Mist’ Clay. I won’t tell nobody.”

T
HEIR WINTER WRAPS
WERE
spread out on the rough plank floor of the old shuttered gatehouse. The boarded brick gatehouse, almost totally concealed with overgrown vines and thick underbrush, was at the entrance of a weed-choked lane that led nowhere.

The grand house that had once sat at the end of the oak-bordered drive had burned to the ground many years ago. The owners never rebuilt on their remote piece of river property.

Mary Ellen had discovered the place one day when a house servant’s pet strayed and she’d volunteered to help with the search. She’d never found the missing dog, but she’d stumbled onto the shuttered gatehouse and promptly claimed it for her own.

Hers and Clay’s.

They were there now on this cold gray Sunday afternoon in January. It was their first time alone together since before the Christmas holidays. Clay had splurged for the occasion, hiring a one-horse gig so he could take Mary away from Longwood and out for an afternoon ride. A ride that brought them directly to this secluded place.

Once inside the small dark enclosure, Clay had quickly touched off the paper and kindling in the old brick fireplace. In minutes a small fire had caught and begun to burn. They had lighted the half dozen candles they’d brought along and placed them on the floor, spacing them out evenly so that they made a large circle. They’d stepped into the circle, shrugged out of their winter wraps, and spread the coats on the cold floor.

They looked at each other, then laughed, and immediately fell to their knees and began kissing.

In a matter of minutes they had shed all their clothes, mindless of the forty-five-degree weather. Warmed by passion, they made love there in the flickering candlelight. Afterward they lay on their backs in silence, hearts beating fast.

The fire now blazed brightly in the brick fireplace. The room was toasty, and their bare bodies were bathed in the fire’s orange glow. They were cozy and contented.

“Mmmmm.” Mary Ellen sighed and turned more fully toward Clay.

She loved to look at Clay’s handsome face right after they had made love. He was a study in tranquility. His heavily lashed eyes were always closed, and his classic features were so totally serene he looked nothing short of angelic. Boyish. Beautiful.

Smiling dreamily, Mary Ellen gazed at his face. And her smile fled. She began to frown, puzzled. Clay’s eyes were wide open. He was staring at the rough ceiling overhead. He didn’t appear to be wonderfully composed and peaceful. Not at all. His tanned jaw was rigid, his full lips compressed, his brow furrowed.

Mary Ellen raised onto an elbow, shoved her wild blond hair behind an ear, and asked worriedly, “What is it? What’s wrong?”

Clay’s head turned slowly. His gaze shifted to her. He swallowed with difficulty and finally said, “You know Brandy. Brandy Templeton.”

“Yes. Of course. You know very well the Templetons live close to Longwood. Why?” She stared at him.

The pulse throbbed in his tanned throat. “Brandy and her father stopped by the cotton office Christmas Eve.” Again he swallowed and folded a hand beneath his head. “She told me she saw you at a Christmas party at the Lawtons.” He fell silent, studied Mary Ellen closely.

“Oh, Clay, I…” Mary Ellen laid a hand on his chest. “I should have told you myself, but I didn’t…”

“Brandy said you were with Daniel Lawton all evening.”

Her mouth rounding in an O of horror, Mary Ellen flipped onto her stomach, put out her hands, and quickly levered herself up. Sitting back on her bare heels, she said firmly, “That’s a lie! I ran from Daniel Lawton all night, and Brandy knows it. I did, I swear it. You have to believe me, Clay, you have to.”

“I
want
to believe you, Mary.”

“Oh, dear God, this is all my fault,” Mary Ellen said, tears filling her dark eyes. “I should have told you about the party myself. I didn’t want to go. I asked to stay home, but Father insisted.”

“And you were never alone with Daniel Lawton?” Clay probed. “You didn’t allow him to drive you home from the party or—”

“Good Lord, No! Never! I wouldn’t do that, ever!” Mary Ellen swore. “The only thing I’m guilty of is not telling you about the party. It was a mistake.” Tears spilled from her eyes. “A big mistake. I didn’t want to upset you, that’s the only reason I kept it from you.”

Agilely, Clay rolled to sitting position beside her. The tenseness was gone from his face. His cold gray eyes had warmed. He gently curled a hand around the side of her neck, and his thumb stroked the hollow of her throat.

“I understand,” he said. “I haven’t been totally honest with you, either.”

Mary blinked to clear her blurred vision. “You haven’t? Is there someone else? Brandy? Have you—”

“No, Mary, not that. You’re my girl, I don’t want anyone else.” He confessed then: “I came to Longwood that night you were gone to the party.”

She made a face. “You came? Titus didn’t say anything, and you never…Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I knew you’d feel bad about my walking there in the cold and finding you gone.” Finally he smiled at her. “I didn’t want to upset you.”

“You didn’t want to upset me?” Mary Ellen, too, began to smile. She had wanted to protect Clay. Clay had wanted to protect her.

Clay’s hand left her throat, moved to her face. With the pad of his thumb, he tenderly rubbed away the moisture from her tear-wet lower lashes. Mary Ellen threw her arms around his neck and laid her head on his shoulder.

“Oh, Clay,” she said, relieved.

“You’d never leave me, would you, Mary?” he said. Before she could answer he tangled his fingers in her unbound hair, drew her head up, and looked directly into her tear-bright eyes. Solemnly he asked, “You couldn’t hurt me, could you?”

“Never, my darling, never.”

When spring came again to Tennessee and Mary still clung to her schoolgirl crush on Clay Knight, her parents were extremely displeased. But, wisely, neither tried to talk her out of her lingering fondness for Clay. They had spoiled Mary Ellen too much, had allowed her to have her way too long. And they knew their willful daughter too well. Should she learn that they were bitterly opposed to her romance with Clay, hell wouldn’t stop her. She would be all the more determined to have him.

There was nothing they could do but bide their time until Mary Ellen broke it off and moved on. Which she would. At least, she’d better.

John Thomas Preble had no intention of allowing his aristocratic daughter to become the wife of a lowly seamstress’s son. He had a much more suitable son-in-law in mind and was confident that Mary Ellen would wake up one day and decide she too preferred to spend her life with a handsome young man who was of her own kind. The patrician Daniel Lawton.

But spring turned to summer and Mary Ellen showed no signs of tiring of her sweetheart.

Julie Preble stood at a tall window and watched the young couple stroll, hand in hand, toward the summerhouse late one scorching hot July afternoon. She was suddenly beside herself. She could stand it no longer. Something had to be done.

She turned from the window, wringing her hands in despair. “John, you must do something at once!” she said to her husband, almost frantic, her voice shrill. “You must forbid Mary Ellen to see Clayton Knight! This foolishness has to end. We have to put a stop to it this minute.”

Calmly, John Thomas Preble rose from his chair, went directly to the rosewood liquor cabinet against the far wall. He took two sparkling brandy snifters from inside the cabinet, unstoppered a carved crystal decanter, and splashed a healthy portion of cognac into the glasses. He went to his wife, handed her a cognac, and encouraged her to drink it straight down. She did. He took the empty glass from her, set it aside, then ushered her over to the long beige-and-white sofa.

At his insistence, she sat down. He sat directly beside her and held out his untouched snifter of brandy. “Drink this one, too, my dear.”

Julie Preble took the glass, turned it up, and drained it.

“There, that’s better,” said her husband. He put an arm around his distraught wife’s slender shoulders. “Now I want you to listen to me, Julie. Don’t interrupt until I have finished speaking. Will you do that?”

She sighed. “Yes. I’ll listen.”

“Good, good. I realize, as you do, that we have a highly dangerous situation on our hands, and it’s my fault. I accept full responsibility. I confess I thought Mary Ellen would have grown bored with Clay Knight long before now.”

“That’s not going to happen, John, she’s—”

“Please, Julie.” He shook his head, silencing her. “Forbidding Mary Ellen to see Clay isn’t the way to handle this problem. You know better. If either of us so much as hints to her that we disapprove, we’ll lose her for good. I want you to promise me you’ll do nothing of the kind.”

Sighing, Julie nodded, knowing her husband was right. “I won’t say a word.”

John Thomas smiled then. He said, “May I remind you, my dear, that I’m a man of considerable influence to whom many a well-placed politician and moneyed comrade owe a personal favor or two.” His confident smile broadened. “Leave everything to me, pet. Hold on a while longer. Give me a little more time to set things in motion, call in some favors.” He brushed his lips to his wife’s pale cheek. “I’ll have our impetuous daughter out of harm’s way with no one the wiser.”

It wasn’t his imagination.

He was sure it wasn’t.

As the weeks of summer had gone by, the Prebles had been become unusually warm and cordial toward him, and Clay couldn’t have been more pleased. John Thomas Preble, especially, made him feel at home. The master of Longwood now talked to Clay as an equal, listening with genuine interest to what he had to say.

Clay had never known his own father, had never had a figure of male authority in his life, so he enjoyed John Thomas Preble’s company, liked talking with him man to man. He was flattered that John Thomas had begun to discuss anything and everything with him. And he didn’t talk down to Clay, didn’t treat him like a child.

John Thomas listened attentively when Clay spoke, and he encouraged Clay to confide in him.

Clay felt sure the change had come about because the Prebles realized that he was now a grownup. An intelligent, dependable adult. A responsible man who was deeply in love with Mary Ellen and wanted to marry her one day. Clay was relieved that he could now talk freely with John Thomas Preble. The two spoke often and at length of Clay’s burning ambition to attend the Naval Academy at Annapolis.

Thrilled to be fully accepted by the Prebles, a jubilant Clay took Mary Ellen in his arms one summer evening and said, “You know, Mary, I believe your father really does like me.”

She laughed at the foolishness of his statement and hugged him. “Well, of course, he does, silly.”

C
LAY KNIGHT STEPPED RIGHT
into the trap that had been set for him.

Throughout that long steamy summer of ’48 John Thomas Preble had cunningly cultivated the unsuspecting Clay. Biding his time, quietly setting in motion his far-reaching, well-laid plans, John Thomas had waited patiently. Then when the time was exactly right, when everything was ready and he had the complete confidence and trust of the guileless young man, he made his move.

The scheme was put in play on a warm Saturday evening in mid-August. Clay arrived early for dinner at Longwood. John Thomas Preble met him at the front door. Smiling broadly, the older man warmly welcomed Clay and guided him directly into the mansion’s spacious drawing room.

“Mary Ellen’s running a little late,” John Thomas said congenially. “You know how females are. Takes them twice as long to dress as it does us men.”

“Yes, sir,” Clay said, nodding, smiling. “But then it’s always well worth the wait, isn’t it.”

“That it is, son,” John Thomas agreed.

He turned and closed the heavy double doors, shutting the two of them inside the lamp-lit parlor. Over his shoulder he said, “As it happens, this is one occasion I’m glad Mary Ellen and her mother are taking so long to get ready.”