Circled Heart (34 page)

“I’m perfectly capable of walking under my own power, thank you. I didn’t mean anything by what I said to Yvesta and you know it. Why are you in such a bad temper? Your home is beautiful, and the party’s going famously.”

“House,” he replied brusquely.

“I beg your pardon.”

“House, not home. It’s just a house.” I was surprised by his abrupt words.

“But it’s a beautiful house, Drew, one you can be proud of. I’ve heard people admire it all evening.”

“Beauty is rare and counts for very little in life, Johanna. You should know that.” I knew he didn’t mean the words as they sounded, but they still hurt.

“Yes, you’d think I would have learned that by now with my unbeautiful but ostensibly remarkable face, but I can be a slow student. Sometimes you have to beat me with a stick before I finally get it.” The stunning Viola with her rich brown hair and mouth like cherries continued to bother me, whether I chose to admit it or not.

“I didn’t mean—” He made no effort to hide his exasperation and I interrupted with similar irritation.

“I know what you meant, but now there are two of us bad-tempered. Go take care of your guests, Drew.”

“That’s what I’m doing.”

“Your other guests then. I can manage just fine without you.”

“So I noticed earlier.”

“What does that mean?” I shrugged off my question before he could explain and continued, “Never mind. I have no idea why we’re arguing and if it was my fault, I apologize. Now, to quote Yvesta, ‘Go away. Sir.’” He didn’t want to smile, but one corner of his mouth gave an involuntary twitch, and I knew his dark mood had passed.

“I will for now, but don’t go too far, Johanna. Remember, you owe me.”

“For what?”

“One word: pies.”

I remembered Thanksgiving. “Oh. That’s right.”

“I’ll collect payment this evening, so go find a quiet spot and stay out of trouble until I can get rid of some of these people. I don’t recall inviting all of them.”

Despite myself, I said, “Surely you remember inviting Viola.”

Drew gave me a speculative look before he responded, “I invited Charles Montgomery.”

“The artist? The one everyone’s talking about?”

“The very same. He’s painting Viola, or so she says, and he brought her.”

“Is that right?” I tried for a skeptical tone but felt suddenly lighter and happier.

“Yes, that’s right. Viola moved on to a man of artistic temperament, one who would feed her soul, she said. I can’t say I blame her. I have never excelled at soul feeding.”

More fool she, I thought, but said only, “A woman has to look out for herself.”

From down the hall someone called Drew’s name, but before he walked away he repeated, “Don’t go too far, Johanna.”

Not tonight, I won’t, I thought. The evening had become interesting again.

As midnight neared, the party grew even livelier, the man at the piano playing something spirited and loud and the guests, by now well and truly inebriated, dancing, laughing, and chattering at top speed. I liked the eclectic mix of people and enjoyed listening in on multiple conversations that took up everything from the war in the Balkans to a Massachusetts textile strike, from the merits of Jung versus Freud to Amundsen’s courageous trip to the South Pole. As I leaned against a shadowed wall, sipped on diluted champagne, and eavesdropped on a unanimous chorus of heated outrage at the federal government’s unrelenting proposal to tax everyone’s income, Byron Stanhope propped himself next to me.

“So this is where you’ve hidden yourself, Johanna, my love.” By the shine in his eyes and the alcohol on his breath, I could tell he’d spent more than enough time at the beverage sideboard.

“Not hidden, Mr. Stanhope.”

“Byron.”

“Not hidden, Byron. Just listening. Will we have a federal income tax, do you think?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea and I can’t say I care. I’m still a British citizen so the old USA only gets the money I choose to give it.” He leaned closer. “Now if you’d like me to spend some money on you, I would do so without question. What would you like? Furs? Jewels? What could I offer that would bring you into my arms?”

“Can you arrange universal suffrage for women?”

“Alas, no.”

“Then I’m afraid I’m forced to stay out of your arms.”

“That’s not sporting.”

“I don’t have to be sporting. Isn’t there someone else you’d rather play with?”

“No. Just you.” He turned toward me more quickly than I would have thought possible for man under the influence and planted both palms against the wall on either side of me. “Did you hear that?” I was annoyed by his proximity and the uncomfortable feeling of being trapped and unable to move without making a scene.

“Hear what?”

“The clock strike midnight. Happy New Year, Johanna.” He leaned to kiss me.

“Will you stop?” I retorted with annoyance. “It isn’t midnight yet and even if it were, I have a very short list of men I choose to kiss. Have I mentioned you’re not on it?” I gave Stanhope a little shove, not threatened, just irritated, but was still relieved when Drew stepped beside us.

“Byron,” Drew said lightly, “go away. You’re annoying Miss Swan and, trust me, that’s not something you want to do.”

Without moving and with his face very close to mine Stanhope murmured, “Why? Does she bite? I’d love to find out. The thought of it makes me shiver.”

“No, Johanna won’t bite, but I will. Now go away.” I didn’t notice anything different in Drew’s tone, but Stanhope apparently did for he slowly straightened and turned to give Drew a surprised look. After a moment spent examining Drew’s face, Stanhope shoved both hands into his pockets.

“Take it easy, Drew. No harm intended. You should have told me.” To me, he said, “I thought you were too good to be true, my love. Please accept my apologies. I didn’t realize.”

I watched him wander off and then turned back to ask impatiently, “What was he talking about? Realize what?” At that moment both the large grandfather clock in the hallway and the more delicate porcelain mantel clock in the room where we stood began their midnight chimes. Around us, the room filled with even more people, everyone coming together to welcome the new year with laughter and loud greetings that gradually silenced as all the inhabitants found someone to embrace. Drew took my hand and pulled me around the corner into the empty hallway.

“Never mind. I hope I’m on your short list,” he said gruffly and kissed me. Then as the clocks stopped chiming and the chatter in the room beyond slowly resumed, he pulled me hard into his arms and kissed me again, very thoroughly, lingering on my mouth and the lobe of one ear in a way that caused wholly new sensations in several parts of my body.

“Johanna,” he whispered, “will there be hell to pay if you don’t go home tonight?”

To give myself time to think, I pulled away just enough to draw his head back down to mine and kiss him again, which, of course, was not conducive to clear thought at all.

“If I don’t go home, where will I go?” I whispered in return. That we felt compelled to lower our voices didn’t make sense because from behind us the piano music was uptempo and loud and people once again laughed and talked, the brief intervention of a new year seemingly forgotten.

“To paradise. If you trust me. Straight to paradise, Johanna.” When I didn’t respond, Drew continued, a depth to his tone I’d never heard before, “I can get rid of all these people very quickly so it would be just you and me. Why not, Johanna? Don’t try to tell me you don’t recognize there’s something special between us, that you don’t feel what I feel or aren’t as eager as I am. We’ll start with just one night, and I promise you won’t regret it.” Taking unfair advantage of my hesitation, Drew began simultaneously to run his hands up and down my back and kiss me along the base of my throat.

All right, I wanted to say, one night or a lifetime. I’ll take whatever you give me. This may be as close to love as either of us gets. But I didn’t say anything like that. I was too afraid of being the one not loved, too proud to be just another Flora or Betsy. Instead, I managed to imbue my words with light, almost mocking, amusement and ask, “Will we be even then?”

Drew ceased all movement and his words came out wary and slow. “What did you say?”

“I asked if my spending the night with you would even up the score between us.”

He pulled both hands away from me as if I were suddenly hot to the touch and stepped back. “Is that what you think?”

“Why would I think anything else? You’re the one who made it a point to say I owed you. Aren’t you just telling me the price you expect me to pay? Don’t misunderstand me, Drew. You make it very attractive and I might be perfectly willing.”

His quiet, steady gaze unnerved me, but by then I felt mired in the need to continue the charade and went on with brittle words that weren’t what I wanted to say at all. Pride or self-protection or vanity or the need to hold the upper hand continued to propel me to a place I did not want to go. Once begun, I couldn’t stop and I wouldn’t take anything back. How could I? I’d look the fool in front of him and shuddered at the thought of being so exposed.

With unintended irony I continued, “I’m just being candid, Drew. You know I like things out in the open. It’s not like you care for me in any lasting or meaningful way. You enjoy variety in women, you said. Marriage wasn’t an option for your future. I just want to be sure I understand the terms of the agreement before I sign. Isn’t that plain good business sense?”

Drew Gallagher eyed me with an intensity that gave the impression I’d turned into a stranger he couldn’t quite place. His face had lost all animation, his eyes guarded and still, the last ten minutes—his arms around me, his lips against the pulse in my throat, and my eager hands pulling his head down to mine with a willingness he couldn’t have missed—something that had never happened.

He took a deep breath, a touch of humanity creeping back into his eyes, and put both his hands into his pockets. “Yes, I suppose it is.”

It took me a moment to return to reality, remember the question, and ask, “Then why are you acting like I’m a child who just threw a tantrum at church? Surely you don’t disapprove of a person getting the facts straight.”

“I’ve changed my mind, Johanna. Sometimes you have the same effect as being doused with a bucket of cold water.”

“You made a business offer and I’m considering it. I once told you I was willing and able to pay all my debts in full and I meant it. I don’t understand why what I said or did should change the mood.” But I did understand, of course. I recognized—more from the depth of feeling in his tone than the few words—that he had divulged more than he’d intended, had made himself as close to vulnerable as he was able. And I had spurned, even mocked, the effort.

“I changed my mind, Johanna,” he repeated. “My timing was wrong.”

“I don’t think timing had anything to do with it,” I said.

“No?”

“You act like you’re disappointed with me, Drew, or surprised by my reaction, but that’s disingenuous on your part. We both know you can’t resist the challenge of trying to entice a woman into your bed. What goes on between the sexes is a competition to you, and I became part of the game. How many points would you have scored for complete capitulation?”

“I’m not the one who makes everything a contest,” he replied shortly.

“Are you saying I do?

His face reflected the scorn I heard in his voice. “‘Be nice to Drew so you get what you want. Do this for me and I’ll do that for you.’ I’d rather have life a competition than a scale, Johanna, with every little gesture weighed in the balance. Nothing given without an expectation of return. I learned that from you, you know. You always expect the worst of men and you always credit them with the worst possible motives. You tar every member of the opposite sex with the same brush, yet if I did that with women, you’d be harping on my unenlightened attitude and lack of fair play. No matter how hard a man tries, he just can’t make it past the barriers you’ve set up to protect yourself.” He was close enough to the truth that I flushed.

“Well, you might have made it past my barriers tonight, but you gave up too soon. Now I’m going home. It’s late.” I marched past him down the hallway before I stopped abruptly and turned around. “What a trite ending! I forgot I don’t have a way home so I either have to borrow Fritz or your telephone.”

Drew went to the end of the hallway and pushed open the kitchen door. “Fritz, do you mind taking Miss Swan home?” To me he added, “I’ll get your wrap.” We stood by the front door wordlessly until Fritz brought the motorcar around to the curb. I was distressed enough that I could have walked home just to use up my excess energy, and it was all I could do to stand next to Drew without fidgeting, fruitlessly wondering if my speculations about his intentions were as accurate as his observations about my character. Snow had fallen steadily the past few hours and still descended without interruption. Everything was blanketed, and I had to step carefully to keep the wet snow from soaking my thin slippers and stockings.

“I could carry you to the curb.” Drew made an attempt to retrieve the conversation, but I would have none of it.

“I don’t need you to do me any more favors. Your favors are as suspect as mine.”

As I picked my way down the walk, I thought I heard Drew say my name, but he could just as well have been cursing me as calling me. Welcome, 1913.

Then the figure of the maiden

Sleeping, and the lover near her,

Whispering to her in her slumbers,

Saying,“Though you were far from me

In the land of Sleep and Silence,

Still the voice of love would reach you!”

Chapter Fifteen

For a woman not given to introspection, I spent the first week of 1913 indulging in nothing but, and with hindsight I realize that everyone with whom I came in contact must have noticed my unnatural state. I snapped short answers to Crea’s innocent questions about the party at Drew’s house and refused to be drawn out by Grandmother’s more oblique inquiries. Once back at the Anchorage, I found it difficult to concentrate and would find myself in Hilda’s office asking the same questions I’d asked the day before.

I could not get Drew’s comments out of my mind, and once I made it past the illogical expectation of his heartfelt and humble apology arriving at my door, I began to examine his observations about my behavior and character. If what he’d said was valid, then in many ways we were two of a kind, both of us using others to get what we wanted. But surely my objectives were worthy and if so, did the end justify the means? How many of my goals stemmed from a truly selfless desire to help others, and how many from a need to prove that I knew best and had the answers? My attempts at serious thought inevitably became clouded by the memory of being in Drew Gallagher’s arms and the absolute pleasure of his touch. How remarkable, really, that Allen Goldwyn’s embrace had aroused in me only a charitable distaste while similar efforts from Drew Gallagher seemed to melt flesh and bone. Love accounted for that and gave me a more sympathetic understanding of many of the girls at the Anchorage. The new year began with a humbling week and month. Character building perhaps but painful nevertheless.

I met Jennie for tea one January afternoon. The snow of New Year’s Eve had long stopped falling, but the first two weeks of the month had been so frigid none of it had melted. Dirty mounds of snow sat at every street corner, making a bleak month even bleaker. I wondered if the gray sky and gray snow accounted for Jennie’s pallid complexion but didn’t mention it. Her mood was low enough without my assistance.

“I had my fitting for my wedding gown yesterday,” Jennie volunteered suddenly.

“Eight weeks until the wedding,” I commented.

“Yes.”

She imbued the single word with such despair that I said impulsively, “Jennie, if this isn’t what you want, call it off. I’ll support you, and I know your father doesn’t want you to be unhappy. I could talk to Uncle Hal if you don’t feel up to it. Perhaps Grandmother would intervene with your mother if you talked the situation over with her. You don’t have to martyr yourself on the altar of matrimony if it’s not what or who you want.”

“I need to be married, Johanna,” Jennie said quietly, and at the odd choice of words, I paused.

“I don’t understand. Is it because of Aunt Kitty or are you feeling pressure from Carl or his family?”

Jennie nodded. “Yes, pressure from all of them,” but I thought her tone and expression were evasive. “Carl’s parents will be in town the second weekend of February and they’re hosting a party for Carl and me at the Chicago Yacht Club.”

“I’ve been there. The way the clubhouse is built over the water offers a beautiful view.”

“Of a vast and frozen lake,” Jennie responded. “I would have suggested a more congenial setting, something with a little warmth and color, but of course, there’s business connected with the reception. I’ve learned there are ulterior motives attached to everything the Milfords do, so it shouldn’t surprise me. The engagement is a good excuse for the family to make alliances with select members of Chicago’s business community and where better than the Yacht Club? The Milfords build ships after all. Carl’s already bought his club membership and he’s making plans to keep one of the family’s yachts in Chicago.”

“One of the yachts?” I asked. “Are the Milfords really that rich, Jennie?”

She didn’t answer at first, only sipped her tea. Finally, “Go ahead and tell me what a lucky girl I am, Johanna. Everyone else does.”

“The Milfords are the lucky ones. How could they find anyone as bright and beautiful as you?”

Unexpectedly, my words brought tears to Jennie’s eyes, and she quickly wiped the tears away with her fingertips. I hadn’t seen my cousin cry since childhood, and the sight so unnerved me that I impulsively reached across the table to her.

“Love, if you’re so miserable, let me help you. You know I’d do whatever I can.” Jennie took a deep breath to fortify herself, and then the tears were gone, replaced by her familiar smile.

“Sorry. Wedding jitters. Invitations to the February reception are going out to all the family, Johanna. Promise me you’ll come.”

“Of course. I wouldn’t miss it.”

“Promise?” Jennie repeated insistently.

“Promise,” I replied and some semblance of a cheerful mood restored, she began to describe her wedding dress.

As Jennie gathered up her gloves and bag, she said, “You know I welcomed in the new year with Carl in Boston, but I heard you were with your Mr. Gallagher.”

“Where did you hear that?”

She smiled mischievously. “Haven’t I told you there are no secrets in the McIntyre family? Did you manage to stay out of trouble?”

“Yes.” Jennie gave me an amused look.

“Hmmm. Your tone tells me that maybe you didn’t stay out of trouble at all. Good for you. I can’t think of any man more tempting than Drew Gallagher. He has an air of promise about him to tempt any woman with blood in her veins. How far did you stray?” I glared, then was forced to smile at her innocent expression.

“Jennie, you are incorrigible. I did not stray.” After a pause I added, “Unfortunately. We got into a huge argument, and I haven’t heard from him since that night. There. Satisfied?”

“Poor Johanna. Don’t worry. He’s so smitten with you, I guarantee he’s already forgotten the whole incident regardless of what it was about.”

“I don’t think either of us will forget. We weren’t very kind to each other.”

“You’re too alike, that’s the problem.”

“We’re nothing alike!” I responded indignantly, secretly dismayed that Jennie had arrived so easily at a conclusion with which I still struggled.

“What an innocent you are! A man sees the same promise in you that a woman imagines in Drew Gallagher. Something not quite respectable but with the potential for pleasure and a little fun thrown in besides.”

“Jennie!”

“It’s true. You’re not the same woman who left for England. You were always a woman of energy and accomplishment, but since you came back, you look for challenges and you relish confrontation. Maybe it was your experience on the Titanic, I don’t know, but now it seems like you have to be in the middle of life. You might as well scrawl Look at me across your chest because that’s the attitude people sense when you walk into a room.”

“You’re wrong,” I answered, more appalled than flattered but afraid she was right. “I’m not like that.”

“Yes, you are, and don’t look so horrified. What’s wrong with it? You’re the one who says it’s a new century and women have new roles now. That vigor is what I admire most about you, Johanna, and it’s part of what makes you so attractive to Drew Gallagher that he can’t keep his eyes off you. He’s accustomed to a different kind of woman and you’ve set him on his ear. He’ll come around. I guarantee it. Lucky you.”

“Lucky?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if he loved you, and if that’s the case, count your blessings. There’s nothing to keep the two of you apart except your own stubborn nature. Even if Grandmother didn’t allow you to do whatever you pleased, it’s clear she approves of Mr. Gallagher. He’s so obviously perfect for you. Some of us have to settle for second.”

If I hadn’t been caught up in Jennie’s comments about Drew and totally self-absorbed with my own life, I might have heard the wistful tone in her last words, heard and followed up on it, asked the right questions, pursued the moment, and perhaps been able to stop what happened later. But to my lasting regret I did none of those things. Instead, I stood up quickly.

“He is not perfect for me,” I retorted. “Really, Jennie, don’t you have enough romantic drama in your own life without invading mine?” She shrugged and stood, too.

“Forget I said anything,” she said and easily turned the conversation to something else as we left the tearoom.

By the time February arrived, I had resigned myself to the fact that I would never hear from Drew Gallagher again. It crossed my mind that I could make the first overture of apology or conciliation, but—in Jennie’s words—my stubborn nature couldn’t or wouldn’t make the gesture. Both Crea and Grandmother carefully avoided Drew’s name—neither of them was slow-witted and I had snapped at them earlier for perfectly innocent comments.

Once Crea tried to pose a careful question, and I answered ungraciously, “I’m not allowed to mention Peter, so I can’t imagine why you think it’s acceptable to pry into my personal life.” The hurt look on Crea’s face made me regret the words as soon as I said them, but the point was made and the damage done. No one tried to interfere any longer in my misery and bad temper. Oddly, I didn’t dream of Drew either. He might never have been in my life at all. I imagined him back with the beautiful Viola, the two of them made for each other, enjoying the paradise he had promised me. Fortunately, an unseasonably warm January thaw had interrupted the deep and unremitting freeze Chicago had experienced, and I was able to take daily, brisk walks. Without those unexpected springlike days, I’m convinced I would have exploded.

I made a return visit to Claudette’s dress shop to plan a gown for the engagement party. “Something in red,” I requested of the owner, “but it’s an afternoon occasion, so nothing revealing or too formal. My cousin Jennie is the belle of the afternoon so my dress should be decorous, tasteful, and simple. But red. Definitely red.” I planned to wear the same gown with appropriate alterations to the city’s Sweetheart Ball held every St. Valentine’s Day, the same ball where three years before I had seen Douglas Gallagher dancing with a beautiful woman in a green satin dress and had tried to imagine what it would be like to be that woman in that particular man’s arms.

“Coincidences do not exist,” my father once told me. “Everything is at the plan of divine Providence, nothing too small and nothing too big to be excluded from God’s good will.” Because my father’s belief was not to be questioned, I could only wonder what plan had been set in motion by my shipboard meeting with Douglas Gallagher. Did Providence really push me back into the Gallagher orbit so I could meet and love Drew and then be miserable the rest of my life? That hardly seemed reasonable or fair.

Claudette’s attempt at keeping me in the background was not quite as successful as I hoped because the dress she created was dazzling in its simplicity and very, very red.

“You’ll have to raise the neckline,” I requested regretfully, “and maybe if you created an overskirt—” My voice trailed off at the look she gave me. “I’m sorry, Claudette, really. The gown is beautiful just as it is, and it would be perfect for the Sweetheart Ball, but I’ll never get away with it for my cousin’s engagement party.” In the end despite her disapproval, Claudette threw a three-quarter-length overskirt of the same red silk over the narrow, hip-hugging skirt and added a fashionable fur-trimmed jacket to conceal the bodice, pieces I could remove when I attended the February Ball. The compromise satisfied both of us.

I needn’t have worried about outshining Jennie. What had I been thinking? When I arrived with Grandmother at the Yacht Club and first saw my cousin in the center of the grand ballroom, I stood literally open-mouthed in admiration before going forward.

“Jennie, you look magnificent!”

Jennie gave a small turn, the ice-blue velvet of her winter gown swirling elegantly around her ankles. “You’re not Claudette’s only patron, you know.” With her gold-streaked hair piled on her head and tiny diamonds dangling from her ears, it seemed a fairy queen had stepped out of the pages of a children’s book.

Seeing the bright color in her cheeks, I went closer to whisper, “No more jitters?”

“No, Johanna. No jitters whatsoever. That’s all past now.” She said the words and followed up with a bland smile before she turned away to greet new arrivals. If her tone was suspect because of its purposeful coolness, I accepted that the present time was hardly the moment for confidences. That will come later, I thought, and made a promise to myself to meet her again soon for tea, somewhere the two of us could talk in confidence. Jennie was like a sister to me, friendly and precocious since the day I crossed my grandparents’ threshold, and I loved her. With her bright eyes and quick mind and unexpected kindnesses, she deserved to be happy.

When Jennie said the party was more a business meeting than a festivity, she wasn’t far from the truth. Many of Chicago’s commercial and industrial elite were present, and Mr. Milford, Senior, moved easily from person to person, introducing himself and his son, supposedly celebrating Carl’s engagement but undoubtedly making contacts and forming relationships he hoped would be more pragmatically useful later. Jennie had given me advance warning about the party’s business aspect, but it never crossed my mind that Drew might be present until I found him looking at me from across the room. I turned abruptly away, more to catch my breath than anything else, only to find him at my side.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded.

His adorable smile made a brief appearance before he replied, “I own banks, Johanna. I’m sorry if I neglected to mention that. Your future in-laws are always on the lookout for a low interest rate. Did you think I manipulated an invitation so I could see you?”

“Of course not.” I snapped the words and followed up with what I hoped was a disdainful sniff.

“Then you’d be wrong because that’s the only reason I agreed to come. Do you honestly think my idea of a good time is talking business with strangers?”