A Song Across the Sea (26 page)

After dinner, Julian and his guest retired to the billiard room to indulge in Julian’s passion for poker. This room was masculine yet steeped in comfort, walnut-paneled and lit by Tiffany chandeliers, with an additional glow from the fire crackling within the antique French fireplace and sending reflections of flames onto the red-veined Italian marble ceiling. This was Julian’s sanctum, where a man could escape from a household full of women, sink into oversized Italian armchairs upholstered in embossed green leather and roll dice on a $1 or $1,000 bet if he wanted to, with no female voice around to call him foolish for it. Next to the ballroom, which his grandfather had decorated in the French style, with white and gold ceiling paintings and a monstrous crystal chandelier, this was his favorite room in the house. He was especially pleased with the built-in humidors that flanked the mantel. Such a civilized way to keep one’s cigars fresh.

So, with cigars and some rather excellent brandy close at hand, the two men played poker well into the night. Julian had developed a love for the game during the war. It helped pass the time during long nights camped out in the field.

Waldron proved a competent player but not a talented one. Julian won as many hands as he lost and ended the evening feeling a warm glow of satisfaction—or was that the effect of the brandy he’d consumed? He had the curious notion that Waldron had been holding back during their poker match, but that was impossible. What would be the point of it? It was an absurd notion. He chided himself for even thinking it.

Waldron liked to win as much as he did.

•  •  •

Adrienne had had enough. She’d agreed to accompany her Aunt Lavinia into town to the milliner’s, but the lengthy discussion of fabric and trim in which her aunt and the dressmaker became immersed bored her to tears.

She decided to wait outside. Unnoticed, she slipped out of the shop as the talk turned to the merits of a forest green velvet material.

Adrienne had hoped the outing might free her from the strange mood that gripped her soon after Noah Waldron’s departure. Why did he arouse such an unsettling feeling in her? She was accustomed to being in control (somewhat of a bully, she admitted to herself), and deeply resented the effect he seemed to have on her. She was no slave to the nonsensical romantic urges that robbed other girls of their reason. Why, then, did she find herself conjuring up fanciful daydreams about that dreadful man: how it might feel to have his arms around her, what his kiss might be like, and even more…turbulent, half-realized fantasies that made her blush and kept her awake half the night.

And he was completely indifferent to her. That was the most aggravating thing of all. At no time during his brief visit did he betray, through a word, or even a glance, the kind of interest in her that she felt in him. It was now two days since he stayed to dinner. Doubtless he was far from Charleston by now, off on another of his innumerable business trips. He’d probably forgotten all about her. He was certainly not suffering as she was, feeling uncomfortably hot and tingly, as if all of her blood was rushing to her skin, summoned there by the never-to-be-fulfilled promise of his touch. She’d no appetite, either. Normally she ate with gusto! Worst of all was that she—who prided herself on her quick, incisive mind—was unable to concentrate on even the smallest detail, while he was carrying on his daily life as usual. The self-satisfied nerve of him!

Damn Noah Waldron. She believed she hated the man.

He was probably with some woman at this very moment. The thought made her bitter. A man like him would always attract the attention of women. He was not married—that much she knew—so he had his choice of consorts. What sort of women did he prefer? Yankee debutantes who’d gone to finishing schools in Philadelphia or Boston? Dance hall girls from his roughhewn western world? Exotically-accented beauties from the capitols of Europe? He could have his pick, damn him, while she was stuck here in this quiet, genteel harbor town with little to choose from but dull planters’ sons and even duller merchants.

A small voice inside of her told her that she hadn’t exactly been accommodating to Waldron, but she brushed it aside as if it were an annoying insect buzzing close to her ear. She was the way she was. She’d change for no man. What should she have done? Batted her eyelashes at him? Made silly remarks?

Waldron wasn’t nearly good enough for her, anyway. She was a du Louvois, descended from aristocrats! The attraction she felt for him was merely a novelty, an accident of chemistry between man and woman. She would probably never see him again, which was a good thing. She had only to bide her time and this awful, unsettling feeling would go away.

But a sorrowful certainty gripped her, one she knew that no amount of trips to town for new hats would banish. She wanted Noah Waldron. She desired him with an urgency that astounded her. Her heart would break if she could not have him. There could be no other man for her.

She wanted him.

The afternoon’s generous complement of Carolina sunshine penetrated these gloomy thoughts only a little as Adrienne left the milliner’s shop. A few horses and carriages were parked along the street outside, but she saw no one she knew. She resigned herself to waiting idly for her long-winded aunt, until some noise from a nearby alley caught her attention.

Men—drunken men, by the sound of it—were hooting and hollering. When Adrienne turned the corner and saw the source of their amusement, she was outraged.

Three ruffians were taking turns hurling chunks from a crumbling stone wall at a mongrel dog tethered to a wrought-iron gate. Trapped as he was, the animal was unable to dodge the projectiles that came his way. He cringed and yelped pitifully, even wagging his bedraggled tail in a futile attempt to placate his abusers. They had been at their target practice for some time. Blood darkened several places on his matted brown fur and he held one injured hind leg up off the ground. The largest of the three men, a redhead in a homespun sweat-stained shirt and trousers, took aim again.

“Stop this at once!” She strode toward him as if she meant to tear him to pieces.

“And what’s it to you, Missy?”

“You will leave this poor dog alone.”

The redheaded man spat a stream of tobacco juice at her feet, then picked up a whiskey jug and took a long pull from it. He wiped his mouth on his shirt sleeve and favored her with a look that was both a glare and a leer.

“It’s my dog. I’ll do as I like.”

“You swine! How dare you mistreat a defenseless animal!”

He looked at his friends and laughed, revealing a mouthful of crooked, yellow teeth. “She doesn’t really care about the dog, boys. I think she just came over here to make our acquaintance. Pretty little thing, too, if only she’d keep her mouth shut.”

There was no use in trying to reason with inebriated scoundrels like these men. Adrienne opted for direct action. She stomped over to the dog and began to untie him from the gate. In a flash, the redhead’s beefy hand was on her arm, wrenching it away from the leash.

“I said, it’s my dog and I’ll as I please.”

Adrienne reached up and slapped him with her gloved hand. In response, he shoved her with a force that caught her off guard. Her head struck the wall hard and she slumped to the ground, stunned.

It was difficult to apprehend clearly what happened next, perhaps because her vision was blurred and her head ached so painfully. She thought she saw Noah Waldron spring at the redheaded man and smash his fist into his face, but that couldn’t be right, could it? Surely Noah was gone from Charleston? The man’s two drunken comrades converged on Noah and she felt fear through her confusion. He was outnumbered. It didn’t seem to matter. In mere moments, the three ruffians lay stretched out on the ground, some unconscious, some moaning.

Then there were shouts, pounding feet, more blurred faces and forms in the alley. Noah crouched in front of her, peering into her face and asking her something, but she couldn’t find the words in her addled brain to form a reply. Why was she unable to speak coherently? And why, when she struggled to her feet with his assistance, did everything seem to swim crazily in front of her eyes? She put her gloved hand to the back of her head and felt a painful swelling. When she brought it away, she noted with detachment that it was covered with blood. Noah saw it, too. He reached toward her just as her legs buckled and oblivion washed over her like a black, peaceful cloud of unknowing.

•  •  •

Of the rest of that day there were only fragmentary moments of awareness. Snatches of conversation. A glimpse of the blue, blue sky. A carriage ride. She felt herself being carried into the house, looked up and saw Noah’s face hovering over her, set in a grim expression. She was told later that the doctor paid a visit, though she couldn’t recall seeing him. In the disjointed haze in which she drifted, one euphoric thought prevailed. Noah Waldron hadn’t left Charleston yet. He was here, somewhere close by. He had saved her. Maybe, just possibly, he cared for her.

She awoke the next morning clear-headed and cheerful, until she tried to sit up in bed. The awful ache in her head reminded her vaguely of the previous day’s unpleasant events. When the pounding at her temples eased, she noticed her father, sitting in an upholstered chair by her bed. He looked exhausted and disheveled, as if he hadn’t put on fresh clothing this morning. Not like him at all, she thought.

He opened his eyes and frowned at her.

“Do you know what you have put us through, young lady?”

She patted the back of her head gingerly with her fingertips. “What’s wrong with me? Why does it hurt so?”

“You had quite a knock on the head, for one thing. But that’ll heal, according to the doctor. You’ll have to stay in bed for a few days. What’s really wrong with you is that you are a pigheaded and foolish young girl. That, I’m afraid, may be a permanent condition. You may grow older—God willing—but you will remain, I greatly fear, pigheaded and foolish.”

It was the sharpest he’d ever spoken to her. She gripped her head in her hands and tried to pay attention.

“What could you possibly have been thinking of, to challenge those men in the alley that way?”

The dog! She was beginning to remember the incident. “What happened to the dog, Papa?”

“That filthy mongrel? The one you nearly got yourself killed for? He’s lying in a basket in the kitchen right now, all clean and bandaged. The way Mr. Waldron fussed over him, you’d think he was a valuable bloodhound. And the kitchen staff is no better, feedin’ him all manner of scraps and such.”

“May Ah keep him?”

Her father laughed out loud, his anger dissipating as quickly as it had come. She knew he couldn’t stay cross with her for very long.

“Since when did you ask my permission to do anything?” he queried her, his amusement obvious. Then he sighed. “However, it’s nice to at least hear those words from you, however rare they may be. Reminds me that I
am
your father.”

“Where’s Mother?”

“Where do you suppose she is? As soon as the poor woman saw Mr. Waldron carrying her senseless daughter into the house, she took to her bed.”

“Ah am sorry to have worried her so. And you, too, Papa. But as you can see, Ah am almost completely recovered. As soon as this infernal headache is gone, Ah shall be right as rain.”

He turned serious. “The man who hurt you is in jail. His friends have been run out of town. The sheriff thought the beating Mr. Waldron gave them was punishment enough. They were drifters—dangerous men. Adrienne, you must promise me that you’ll never do anything like that again. I shudder to think what would have happened if Waldron hadn’t seen you turn into that alley and followed you, out of curiosity—”

“Where is he?” she interrupted. “Mr. Waldron, Ah mean. Ah’d… Ah’d like to thank him.”

“He left this morning. Said something about having business in Chicago.”

She looked crestfallen.

“You’re disappointed,” Julian observed thoughtfully, as if an unexpected idea were dawning on him.

“It’s just that… Ah’m very grateful to him. Naturally. Good manners call for me to thank him, don’t they?”

“It’s nothing more?”

“Don’t be absurd, Papa.”

He stood up, moving stiffly and looking a few years older than he’d looked yesterday. She felt a sudden jolt of remorse. What she’d put him through, with her ill-advised adventure!

To her relief, he smiled reassuringly.

“You rest now,” he said. “I’ll have some breakfast sent up to you.” Julian left the room, an unusually calculating expression on his face.

A
drienne named the dog, “Beauregard.” Beau, for short. He rewarded his rescuer by becoming her devoted companion and ferocious protector. When his injuries healed, she gave him a thorough bathing in a washtub set on a sun-dappled patch of ground behind the house. When his coat was still damp she combed it with tender care, removing the snarls and tangles that refused to be tamed, trimming the ragged ends that gave him the appearance of a canine hobo. He would never be a handsome beast. His color was nondescript and his off-kilter proportions betrayed his deliriously mixed ancestry. Under her care, however, an affectionate, even noble personality emerged.

Life at Arcadia quickly returned to an even keel. Occasionally, when walking through the stables or lying awake at night, Adrienne was seized by a terrible thirst for…for what, she could not say. It came from deep inside.

Word of the sale of Mistress Maya had gotten round, bringing even more well-heeled buyers to the estate. Julian was pleased. Business was better than ever. Adrienne’s assistance with the thoroughbreds allowed him more time to concentrate on his other enterprise. He expanded his whiskey distillery and made a number of tips to meet with distributors and increase his outlets.

It was on one of these junkets that he again encountered Noah Waldron. Not strictly a business trip, he allowed to himself. His wife would not approve of all the activities involved, if she knew, but then women lacked insight into the ways men conducted their business affairs. No, she would only see the setting, a gilded riverboat traversing the muddy flow of the Mississippi River, and conclude that he was merely playing cards and losing money.