Sycamore Hill (2 page)

“Your parents felt misplaced guilt over running off and leaving
Charles to face the scandal and rumors; so they contacted him when you were
expected and asked him to be godfather. Charles accepted to salvage his pride.
Then he set about courting another heiress a few years older than him—Marcella
Av-eiy. He went through her money in a matter of a few years. He was again in
financial difficulties when the influenza epidemic hit New York. Your parents
died, and you were sent here.

“Your parents were very young and unduly trusting. The letter you
handed over to Charles Haversall was a handwritten will hastily drawn up just
before your father died. It gave trusteeship of your inheritance over to
Charles. Your father listed certain obligatory terms, of course, but they were
kept only minimally. As for the bulk of your inheritance, that went straight
into Charles Haversall’s private bank account.”

I felt curiously numb by all this information. My mouth was dry,
but I sat staring into my teacup, not attempting to drink from it. My mind was
a turmoil of whirling memories reviewing the 18 years I had lived in this
brownstone mansion.

I had seldom been in contact with my guardian as a child. Charles
Haversall spent most of his time away from the brown-stone and the mercurial
moods of his wife, Marcella. When he was home, he ensconced himself in the
library with a bottle of expensive French brandy.

From the first, Charles had preferred me out of sight and mind and
employed in what he called “worthwhile pursuits.” Marcella enrolled me in a day
school. When I was at the brownstone, I was relegated to Roberta Gillicuddy’s
stem care and trained to carry out menial tasks to assist her.

As I grew older, Charles Haversall’s interest only changed
slightly. I began taking my meals with him and Marcella. Once in a while he
would glance over his reports and notice me. The conversation never included
me.

When I turned 12, Marcella’s interest altered. She was alarmed at
my size. I had reached my alarming adult height of 5-8, unheard of for a child
my age and most grown women. Marcella looked on me as a freak of nature, and I
remembered her barbs only too well. When my beanpole body began to alter,
rounding out and filling in, Marcella Haversall became even more alarmed. When
I was 16, she decided I was much too endowed for a proper lady, and she took me
straight to her dressmaker, who designed bodices to conceal my defects.

My thick fall of auburn hair seemed to annoy Marcella Haversall
even more. She had a pale blond beauty that washed out against the colors of
the current fashion. She thought my hair wild and untamed and insisted that I
coil its sheening mass tightly and hide it beneath a fine pale netting. For the
most part, my wardrobe consisted of earth tones. The severely cut styles and
carefully coiled mane gave me a prim, austere appearance.

My relationship with Charles Haversall had been almost
nonexistent. The one with his wife, Marcella, had been one of reverent
servitude. She had been peevishly demanding at times, while at others she had
shown surprising kindness. Several times she had given me small gifts at the
most unexpected moments. Usually they were things she had received from friends
and did not want herself, but they still brightened my drab existence.

It had only been when I talked of leaving that Marcella Haversall
used pressures I could not fight. Several times I had approached the subject
hopefully, only to have her make me feel guilty and ungrateful for even
suggesting I carry out my dreams.

The last time I had brought up the dreaded subject had been four
years ago. Marcella had been applying a coat of pale powder to her
already-colorless skin while she sat before her vanity. When I made my request,
she looked at me through the mirror, her expression wounded.

“Doesn’t your lovely room suit you?” she had asked. My room was
far from lovely when compared to the other bedrooms in the house, but I had
never allowed it to distress me.

“My room is fine.”

“Haven’t we been good to you, Abigail?” she went on, scarcely
hearing my mumbled reply. I knew what was coming and prepared myself. She
turned on me, the hurt expression altering to scorn and indignation. “We have
been very good to you. And this is how you repay us. You speak of deserting us?
You know very well the hardship it’s been for us to have you here,” she
continued, exaggerating their sacrifice, though at the time I was not fully
aware. “We’ve bought your clothes, given you an excellent education, given you
a home with affection. And now you talk of walking out on us. Charles has been
most generous to you, and he would be terribly hurt for you to do this to him.
Why, there is the dinner party next week, and after that the charity ball, and
shortly after that there’s the Christmas season and its round of parties. You
know how Gilly is without your help. She’s in her dotage, and the house and
kitchen would be in an absolutely dreadful state if you deserted her. But go
ahead! Be selfish! Be ungrateful! Don’t remember all we’ve done for you!”

And so I had stayed. And my dependence upon the Haversalls had
grown as my prospects had diminished. My life had become centered around their
needs, their demands, their expectations of my future. After a while, I stopped
thinking of going away at all. When I had precious spare time, I lost myself in
books and gleaned my adventures and joy from them.

Now the news Bradford Dobson was giving me shattered the frail
network of my life. All that I thought was, was not. All that had been, had
never really been. And I could feel nothing.

“Miss McFarland. Miss McFarland,” Bradford Dobson beckoned me back
to the present. I blinked and then smiled apologetically.

“I am sorry for daydreaming.” My statement brought a rather incredulous
expression into Dobson’s stiff features.

“Do you understand what I’ve been telling you, Miss McFarland?”

“Yes. I believe I do.” I sounded flat of emotion, and Dobson made
an impatient, disbelieving sound in his throat.

“You can’t possibly understand, not if you can sit there so calmly!
My dear young woman, the Haversalls have systematically stripped you of your
inheritance. I don’t have the exact sum here with me, but I know it was no
small fortune, and well beyond what the Haversall estate contains now. They
used your inheritance to buy these expensive things.” He waved his hand about
the exquisite room. ‘The Dresden figurines, the rich carpets, the original oil
paintings. They went to Europe every year, while they left you here to manage
the household. They had dinner parties. They went to concerts, plays, and
charity banquets, where they gave away your money. Marcella Haversall spent a
fortune on her gowns. And you....” He stopped, looking disparagingly down at my
mauve gown. He flushed slightly and shook his head.

“And what did they do for you, Miss McFarland? They did take you
in. They did feed you and clothe you and give you an education.” His tone was
derisive, and then it rose again in indignation. “But you were entitled to the
most expensive gowns, the finest Paris could offer. You were entitled to the
most exclusive schools, the Grand Tour. Anything. Everything. Instead, Charles
Haversall robbed you of everything but a paltry sum. He and his wife treated
you as a penniless waif they took in through the goodness of their cold-blooded
hearts. They trained you to serve them like some brainless lackey. And now they
leave you without even a stipend in their will, without a mere mention, almost
destitute. When I think of their deception, it utterly appalls me. And yet you
sit there.” He looked at me, his face lined and white. “Don’t you understand?
All this should, by rights, belong to you. But Charles Haversall left his
entire estate to an indifferent and insensitive nephew in Maine.”

I remembered once Marcella had suggested that if I wanted to
leave, Charles could arrange for me to work at the factory. Even now, the
thought made me shudder. The people there were heavily overworked and grossly
underpaid. I had once overheard Roberta talking to one of the maids about a
child who had gotten caught in the machines. Nothing had stopped, and the
child’s broken body had been pulled free. He had died several days later. The
fault had been the lack of safety precautions, but even the child’s death had
not altered anything. Everything remained as it was. From Roberta’s tone, I
knew that it had not been the first time something of that sort had happened.
Yet, Charles Haversall always maintained that there was not enough money to
improve conditions, and if the workers did not like it, they could go elsewhere
for work. The workers in Haversall’s factory were as bound there as the slaves
had been before the war.

I had always sympathized with the workers. I had much in common
with them. My life depended on Charles Haversall, and though I longed to be free
and independent, each year seemed to make me less so. I had no money and
nowhere to go. And I knew the sordid truth. If I had known it years ago, would
it have changed anything? Bradford Dobson said that Charles Haversall had
carried out the letter of the will. How could I have fought him?

And what about now?

The numbness was wearing off. I began to feel angry, not so much
at the Haversalls as at myself. All the years I had allowed myself to be used,
when I might have broken away and established my own life. I had hung back from
gratitude and loyalty to the Haversalls. Or was that really the truth? Wasn’t
it more the truth that I had been afraid to leave my dull but secure existence
here in this old brownstone? I had seen little of Boston and nothing of the
world, and it was frightening to think of setting off on my own.

“I’ve been such a fool,” I breathed, and Dobson’s face softened.

“There was no way you could have known what they were doing, Miss
McFarland. And even if you had, I doubt if you could have stopped them.”

“I should have left years ago before I allowed my life to pass me
by!”

The solicitor smiled then. “At the age of twenty-three your life
has hardly passed you by,” he remarked with some humor.

"You said yourself that most women my age are married with
families of their own,” I countered with wryness.

“You are a very attractive young woman—”

“Please don’t be kind, Mr. Dobson,” I said quickly, embarrassed
that he should feel he needed to say such a thing. Marcella Haversall had been
most clear about my limitations in that area.

“Kindness has nothing to do with it, Miss McFarland,”

Dobson insisted. “With the right clothes and hair style….”

He stopped and spread his hands in an apologetic gesture. “I
overstep myself. I do apologize.”

“You spoke of my guardian’s nephew,” I primed.

“Yes. I’m afraid Wendall Haversall wants this house and all his
uncle’s holdings sold.” Dobson lowered the final blow.

“In other words, the new Mr. Haversall wants me out of this house
almost immediately,” I said, somehow managing to not allow the fear that was
beginning to prey wantonly on my nerves to show. Where could I go? What could I
do?

“Yes. He already has a prospective buyer.”

“He didn’t waste any time. My guardian has only been dead ten
days.”

“What will you do. Miss McFarland?” Dobson asked as delicately as
he could.

“I don’t know. I... I don’t know,” my voice shook in spite of my
efforts. “Find a position, I suppose,” I said with more control. “That would be
the most sensible thing to do.”

The first thing that popped unwelcome into my mind was the
Haversall factory, that looming gray edifice that blighted the landscape of
Boston. In my imagination I could hear the men and women moaning as they
dragged themselves exhausted to labor in the bowels of the rat-infested
building. I could hear the children screaming as they were caught and ground in
the merciless machines. I shivered, and my mouth twitched.

“What kind of position, if I might ask?” Dobson pressed.

“I... I don’t know,” I admitted, licking my dry lips and
determinedly pressing away the picture of the factory. “House service... I
don’t know.” The despair of my situation was beginning at last to sink in, and
I started to shake.

“You completed your secondary education, did you not?” Bradford
Dobson asked, reaching across to pat my hand with his own. Mine were ice-cold
and clutched tightly in my lap.

“Yes,” I nodded, staring into Dobson’s clear, intelligent gaze.

“Would you consider teaching?”

“I’m sure I lack the necessary qualifications, Mr. Dobson,” I said
with near-certainty. “Boston requires—”

“I wasn’t thinking of Boston.” He smiled.

“No?”

“No.”

“Then where?” I asked, curious now.

“Perhaps out West someplace. Their requirements are not nearly so
rigid. You could make a life out there for yourself, Miss McFarland,” he
suggested.

A quick rush of excitement pushed my gray thoughts away. “I’ve
always had a great interest in California,” I admitted.

Dobson’s eyes moved assessingly over my face. “You look quite
different when you smile like that, Miss McFarland.” I was not sure what he
meant, and I chose not to answer. “Do you like children?” he asked.