When the Splendor Falls (7 page)

A smile, that might have seemed sly had it not been dimpled, tugged at Blythe’s lips as she caught her sister’s eye. Only she and Leigh, not even Julia, knew how happy Leigh had been to return home to Virginia from Charleston.

“I could just gaze for hours upon hours at that beautiful painting of Charleston that your mama has in the foyer of Travers Hill. I declare, Leigh, tears come to my eyes when I think of all that we’re missing. I wonder if any of my beaus even remember me. That spiteful cat Libby St. Martins was always trying to steal them away from me,” Julia fretted, her full-lipped mouth forming a petulant pout as she watched with a disagreeable eye the dragonfly hovering over her flower-trimmed bonnet. “La dee, but I’ve been so excited, Leigh, since Mama’s been feeling under the weather. It’s this heat. Mama swears she will expire, and I do believe she is serious. You should see the way her hair cannot hold even the tiniest curl. Well, she will not accept it another day! Papa says we’ll be going to Newport sometime in August. And you’ll never guess, Leigh, but Papa is planning to take Mama and me to England! Isn’t it just too wonderful for words,” Julia exclaimed, clapping her hands and causing her parasol to tip precariously close to the pony’s fat rump before she jerked it back, nearly poking Blythe in the eye. “We’ll take the boat from Charleston, of course, so I’ll get to see all of our dearest friends again. I suppose you couldn’t sweet-talk your papa into allowing you to accompany us? It would be so amusing if we could both be in London at the same time. Think of the secrets we can share. I think we’ll even cross the Channel and visit Paris, and in the spring, Leigh! Can you imagine the romance of it? All of our dreams will come true.

“I dare say I’ll have my portrait painted by a handsome, dissolute young English lord who has been disinherited by his father, the duke of something-or-other, and has been banished to the Continent. He will be maddened by my unparalleled beauty and won’t be able to stay away from me. Why, I could return to Virginia a duchess! La dee, that Libby St. Martins would turn pea green with envy, wouldn’t she. I’d even marry a fat ol’ duke, ugly as my second cousin, Harmon Cawley, on my mama’s side of the family—you remember him, don’t you, Leigh?—he has such bulging eyes and he’s always gulping between words…well, I’d do it just to see Libby St. Martins’s face turn all red and mottled trying to catch her breath. She’d be so ugly then she couldn’t catch even a fish, or even poor ol’ Harmon,” she said with a laugh of wicked delight. “Why, come to think of it, Harmon does look like a fish. But then, all the Cawleys do. You ought to see my cousin Eulalie, Harmon’s sister. Her mama just despairs of ever finding that girl a husband. And if they do, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he isn’t in trade. It will be quite the scandal and I dare say the Cawleys will never be invited to Royal Bay again.

“I do believe Libby St. Martins thinks she’s going to wed that Matthew Wycliffe,” Julia continued, casting a curious glance at her quiet friend, but Leigh had her face slightly averted and Julia couldn’t see her expression. “Not that I’m interested in him, even if he is one of the wealthiest gentlemen in the Carolinas, because I’m only going to marry a handsome, titled Englishman. Oh, Leigh, I’ve just got to be engaged by Christmas. I don’t know what I’ll do if I’m not. Grandmama was married by the time she was seventeen and she was in the family way before she was eighteen. I’m almost eighteen, and so are you, and I haven’t
even
received a proposal. At least not one I’d accept. I’ll just die if Libby St. Martins gets engaged before I do. Mama didn’t marry until she was almost an old maid. I won’t wait that long, I just won’t!

“Leigh! Did I tell you about my gown for the party?” Julia cried out as she suddenly remembered the package that had arrived at Royal Bay just the day before. “Why, it just took my breath away. It arrived yesterday—and unfortunately so did Adam—and from Charleston! I told Mama upon my arrival home that I insisted on keeping that French dressmaker or I would never leave my room! And she knew I meant it. Even though I’ve had to return to Virginia, at least I will still be dressed in the height of fashion. Blond lace, Leigh,” she told her friend with a widening smile, her light gray eyes wide with the wonder of it all. “Yards and yards of it! And it is quite décolleté. Scandalous, even. Cream satin, flounced all around the skirt and draped with bunches of blushing pink satin rosebuds and ribbons! And I’ll be wearing my necklace of pearl beads that I got for Christmas last, and I’ll have my hair arranged à la—oh, and you’ll never believe what Adam said when he saw me yesterday eve! I had to try on my new gown so Mama would have time to sew the alterations if need be, but Simone is such a fine seamstress that not an extra stitch had to be taken, although I was quite despairing that Mama was going to add an extra inch of lace to my bodice.

“And Adam, standing there with that grin of his, well, he can say the most outrageous things! I’ll have you know I had ol’ Bella check my linens before I got into bed last night. Well, I was close to tears worrying about what trick he had up his sleeve. I dare say he’s lurking around here somewhere right now waiting to pounce on us. He threatened as much. You will remember.”

Blythe glanced over her shoulder, hiding her yawn as Julia continued with her usual patter about anything and everything that came and went in her head. In the last few days, Blythe had come to the conclusion that she’d liked Julia far more before she and Leigh had gone off to finishing school in Charleston—especially since Julia had returned wearing one of the roundest steel-hooped crinolines Blythe had ever seen, and if that was what Adam Braedon had jested about, then she could certainly understand. Julia hadn’t even been able to get through the front door of Travers Hill. Poor Stephen would never be the same, Blythe thought, remembering the expression on his face when Julia had gotten caught half in and half out of the doorway, her crinoline flying high in back and baring her pantaloons for all to view. And trying to share a small seat with Julia, fashionably dressed in her prized crinoline, was anything but pleasant, Blythe thought as she pushed down the wave of striped muslin, fluffy petticoat, and rigid crinoline that spread out around Julia and threatened to engulf the cart.

Leigh, however, had come home from Charleston the same beloved sister who’d left, and still wearing the same unfashionable crinoline she’d left home in, much to Stephen’s relief. Although, for the first couple of weeks, Blythe had known a certain consternation when her sister had used French phrases when asking for potatoes at the dinner table, but their mother had been delighted. Leigh had even declined to play croquet on the lawn in favor of reading a book,
An Essay
…or something equally dull, Blythe remembered with a grimace, and then her sister had made an incredible fuss over the childish bodice of one of her favorite gowns, which had sent their father into an ominous silence when he’d seen the new cut of the décolletage of Leigh’s once modest blue gown.

But last week, when Leigh had grabbed a sweet roll on her way out the door, unable to linger for a proper breakfast in her haste for a ride across country with Guy, and Saturday last, when she’d stayed up until well past midnight helping with a difficult breech delivery of a foal, and this morning, when she’d suggested they go blackberry picking, Blythe had known that her sister’s sojourn in Charleston had not had any damaging effects.

“Oh, la dee, but this is nice,” Julia murmured as the cart rolled toward a sun-dappled creek, shaded by hemlocks and sycamores that beckoned the three girls with its soft murmuring into the cool shadows of the glade. “We can have our picnic over there,” Julia directed as the cart came to a halt in the shade of a tall sycamore. To their right, and indeed the perfect spot for a picnic, was a gentle rise of bank carpeted with meadow-sweet grasses and wildflowers, the overhanging boughs of one of the hemlocks creating a natural canopy above their heads.

“I am absolutely parched,” Julia said with a dramatic sigh. Climbing down from the cart, she had no idea of the comical figure she appeared as she tried to gather her billowing skirts and stiff crinoline, keep her parasol shading her delicate complexion, the basket of stuffed eggs and sponge cake from tipping its contents, and all the while maintain her ladylike dignity as she blindly searched for a safe footing on the uneven ground. And it proved no easy feat, for by the time Julia had stepped away from the cart, she was flustered and out of breath from the effort, her fancy bonnet askew, and a delicate strand of pale blond hair dangling untidily across her cheek.

“I hope Jolie remembered to pack a refreshment, Leigh,” Julia said faintly, eyeing the cool waters of the stream with little interest.

“Lemonade,” Blythe told her cheerfully, jumping down from the cart with annoying ease and grace, her long, dark brown hair tied with a satin bow and swinging freely around her shoulders. Her saucer-shaped straw bonnet was tipped at a rakish angle and seemed to mirror her gaiety. Ignoring Julia’s sniff of superiority—after all, there were certain discomforts a lady had to suffer to be fashionable—she squeezed past the voluminous skirts threatening to wrap themselves around the tree. Her own layered petticoats were far more practical for blackberry picking than wearing a crinoline, but Julia had seemed doubtful of Leigh’s suggestion to take off her crinoline and leave it in their bedchamber at Travers Hill. She had also refused to borrow one of Leigh’s old muslins, obviously believing she would encounter one of her hearty sea captains strolling through the woods. Blythe smothered a laugh at the thought of encountering a ship under full sail entangled in the honeysuckle and quickly set the basket down, but her hazel eyes twinkled with humor as she spread out a quilt snatched from the linen closet. The fragrance of lavender and roses still clung to the soft folds; delicate aromatic sachets, prepared by their mother’s own hand, scented all of the linens at Travers Hill.

“Shall we eat first, or look for berries?” Leigh inquired, unhitching the pony from the cart and sending him with an affectionate pat on his rump into the meadow to graze with the mare and the colt.

“Eat!” Julia said with unladylike vigor. “Well, at least I believe we will do a far superior job picking berries if we keep our strength up. And I do not intend to wander far even then. I’ll have you know this is my best pair of kid slippers,” she told the Travers sisters as she tried to settle herself as comfortably as possible on the outspread quilt. Her careful descent to the ground would have earned high marks and praise in Madame St. Juste’s proper deportment class, but when Julia’s shoulders and head disappeared beneath the rustling mound that had enveloped her, Leigh and Blythe started to laugh, at first softly, then loud enough even for the missing Julia to hear inside her silken cocoon.

“La dee,” came the faint voice from inside the crinoline, “I swear this is one fashion I could do without,” Julia declared, a sheepish grin on her face as she peeped from the folds. “Very well, help me from this cage,” she pleaded, her hands reaching out for help.

Blythe stared at Julia in surprise, pleased that their friend hadn’t completely lost her sense of humor in Charleston.

“Never will I doubt your advice again, Leigh,” Julia admitted as she was pulled to her feet, looking like a giant flower opening its petals. “Unfasten me, dears,” she said, sounding like the grand dame she’d been playing for the last few weeks. “If it were not that I am half-starved for those stuffed eggs, which are just out of reach in my current predicament, then I would suffer this torture, however…since we aren’t in Charleston supping on the lawns of the Craigmores’ house overlooking the Ashley River, with my faithful beaus surrounding me, I will forgo fashion for the moment.”

“Welcome home, Julayne,” Leigh said, unfastening Julia’s crinoline and smiling with satisfaction as the offending object rolled away and Julia’s skirts returned to an almost manageable size, and allowing room now for everyone to sit on the outspread quilt.

“Except for Adam calling me that, and he does it to tease me, I don’t think I’ve heard that name in years, at least not since we went away to Charleston,” she stated, seating herself with far more ease this time. “La dee, but I’m so hungry I’m even looking forward to your mama’s chicken curry and rice tonight,” Julia said, digging into the basket from Royal Bay as she pulled out the stuffed eggs that had so tantalized her.

“I thought you liked curry and rice,” Leigh said as she knelt down, the skirts of her plain muslin gown spreading out around her. She began to unload the basket, setting the china plates and silverware, napkins and goblets out on the blanket.

“Oh, dear, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded, truly I didn’t. But we had curry and rice all the time in Charleston, Leigh. It used to seem so exotic and foreign when I’d have it at Travers Hill, especially the way Jolie fixed it and with your mama being from Charleston, and descended from the French aristocracy. All we ever had, and still do, at Royal Bay are butter beans and plain ol’ ham. When I got to Charleston, though, it didn’t seem so wonderful anymore, especially since we seemed to have rice with everything! I declare, I thought we’d have it at breakfast even,” she said, watching as Leigh loaded her plate with an assortment of delectables. “Another biscuit with pâté, Leigh, please,” she entreated, smiling widely as another biscuit found its way onto her plate. “Of course, I do believe I really am looking forward to that curry and rice this eve, now that I’ve returned to Virginia.”

“I put the jar of lemonade in the stream, it’ll be cool in a few minutes,” Blythe said as she dropped down beside them and accepted her plate with a wide grin of pleasure, forgetting about the final fitting for her ball gown on the morrow as she gave in to her healthy young appetite.

“You are a sweet dear, Lucy,” Julia said, sounding as if she were far older than she was—but two years makes a big difference in a girl’s life, especially if she has been away at finishing school. “Naturally you will be wearing a new gown for your sixteenth birthday party,” she said matter-of-factly. “I seem to recall vaguely that I had a pink gown for mine,” she remembered with a slight frown of concentration, as if the event had occurred a century ago.