Mirror Image (18 page)

"I'll have Pethe build a fire for you outside. Perhaps we should bury
some of it." Olivia nodded. She had made a separate, smaller bundle with
what might have been the baby, and that had been her intention.

Olivia and Bertie looked grim as they watched Petae first dig a hole and
then build a fire. The linens went onto it, the rest went into the hole
and was quickly gone, and the two women stood side by side, shivering in
the winter morning. It was a silent vigil that should never have been,
and Bertie put a gentle arm around her shoulders.

"You're a good girl, Olivia, " she said quietly. She had understood
completely. "How is she? "

"She looks awful, " Olivia said honestly.

"But please don't tell her I told you. She'd kill me."

"I won't.

But she must have the doctor today. She could die from an infection.

" Just he'ring those words made Olivia's heart tremble in her chest and
she nodded.

"Then get him. I'll deal with her, " and then with worded eyes, "What'll
we tell Father? "

"Influenza, I guess, " Bertie said with a sigh. She had been afraid of
that. Like everyone else in the house, she had heard whispers and
stories. "It's not fair to worry him though.

Perhaps you ought to say something."

"Oh Bertie, I can't." Olivia looked horrified. How could she possibly
tell him Victoria had been pregnant? "I wouldn't know what to tell him."
But she didn't want to worry him about influenza either.

"You'll think of something, dear." Bertie reassured her. But by later
that morning, when Olivia checked on her, Victoria was hemorrhaging
again, and she was barely coherent. By that afternoon, the doctor had
been called, and he called for an ambulance and took Victoria to the
hospital in Tarrytown for three transfusions. There had been no way of
keeping it from their father by then, and Victoria was sobbing
hysterically as bottles of blood went into her arm, and Olivia sat
beside her trying to calm her down. But it was hopeless, she was
consumed with guilt and misery, she was still in pain, she was weak and
confused, and although Victoria swore it wasn't true, Olivia knew she
was still in love with Toby, and longing for him.

Their father sat in the waiting room for hours, and he looked bleakly at
Olivia when she finally came to tell him Victoria was sleeping.

The doctor had assured them that she'd be all right eventually. They had
decided not to do surgery, and he promised everyone concerned that he
was sure she would still be able to have children. The baby she had
conceived had apparently been larger than it should have been at that
stage, she might even have conceived twins originally, and there had
been an unusual amount of bleeding when she lost it. But there was
certainly no way of pretending to anyone in the hospital or the family
that Victoria had influenza. The doctor had promised Edward Henderson
that everything would be handled as discreetly as possible, but Edward
also knew that no matter what they did, eventually word would get out.

And it would be all over New York that Victoria had lost Toby
Whitticomb's baby.

It would confirm every rumor they'd heard prior to that, and put the
last nail in the coffin which contained her now-defunct reputation.

"He might as well have shot her in the head, " Henderson said unhappily
as he sat in the waiting room with Olivia before he left to go home
again. Olivia had already said she would sleep in a cot at the end of
her sister's bed for as long as she had to.

"Father, don't say that, " Olivia gently chided. But she could see in
his eyes how devastated he was by all this, and how gravely he feared
for her reputation.

"It's true. The man destroyed her. And to put at least some of the blame
where it belongs, she destroyed herself. She was incredibly foolish. I
only wish someone could have stopped her, " he said to no one in
particular, and Olivia felt it a reproach which she instantly answered.

"I tried, Father, " she said softly.

"I'm sure you did, " he said through clenched teeth. His lips were so
thin they were barely visible, as they always were when he was angry.

And he was more than angry this time, he was worried about her too, and
what she had done to herself, and the rest of them, through her brief,
but stupid, alliance. And then he looked pensively down at his other
daughter. "She really has to get married. That would clean it up a bit.

The tongues might be less inclined to wag if the story had a proper
ending."

"He can't marry her, " Olivia said quietly. Her father was as deluded as
Victoria if he thought Toby would do that. He was married to an Astor.

"He can't marry her, " her father agreed with her, "but someone else
can. If anyone is willing to, after all this. It would probably be the
best thing for her."

"She doesn't want to marry anyone, " Olivia explained as though her
father wasn't understanding. "She says she never wants to marry anyone,
or see another man again, and this time, I think she means it."

"That's understandable, after what she's been through." He hadn't been
told the details, but he was sure that what had transpired the night
before had been far from pleasant. Perhaps, in its own way, it served as
an additional lesson for her. "I'm sure she'll feel differently about it
later." And he was not sure he cared if she didn't. She had done
something that would hurt all of them in the end, and now she had to
make restitution. "Don't worry about it, my dear." He kissed Olivia
absentmindedly, and he was frowning when he left to go back to the
house, and left Olivia with her sister.

They gave Victoria another transfusion late that night, and for a while
it looked as though she might have surgery after all, but in the
morning, she seemed desperately weak, but slightly better. It was
another two days before she sat up in bed, and two days after that
before she walked, but by the end of the week she was home, in her own
bed, with Olivia and Bertie fussing over her, and she looked more like
herself when they propped her up in bed and fed her. But by the time she
got home, their father had gone to New York, to attend to business.

He had to meet with his attorneys about the mill, and it was all he
could do to control himself when he ran into Toby Whitticomb at the
University Club when he went there for lunch with John Watson and
Charles Dawson.

John Watson eyed Edward carefully and asked if he was all right, and
Edward only nodded. But fortunately, Toby left with a group of friends a
few minutes later. He had said nothing to Henderson, and he avoided
making eye contact with John Watson.

Edward went back to Croton after two days, satisfied that he had taken
care of everything he wanted to do in New York. He had stayed at the
Waldorf-Astoriaa this time. He didn't even want to see the house again.

Too much had happened there in the past, and recently, and in any case,
he hadn't brought any of the servants. Just Donovan and his car, and the
hotel provided everything else he needed.

It was ten days before Thanksgiving when he got back, and Victoria was
walking slowly around the grounds on her sister's arm when he arrived.

She looked a great deal healthier than she had when he left, and he was
sure that in another day or two she'd be fine. He was going to wait
until then to tell her.

He told them both at the same time. He had no secrets from Olivia, and
he wanted her support. But whether she agreed with him or not, the
arrangements had been made. And everything had been agreed to. On Sunday
afternoon, he asked them both to step into the library with him, and
Olivia sensed immediately that he had something to tell them. She had
the odd feeling that he was going to send them somewhere, perhaps to
Europe for a while, to get Victoria's mind off Toby, though she had said
nothing about him since New York, and even in the hospital, she had
refused to talk about him. Olivia knew she wasn't over him, but she
still felt so betrayed, she couldn't bear to talk about it.

"Girls, " her father began without ceremony, "I have something to tell
you." He looked at them both somewhat ferociously, as Victoria wondered
what he had to say to them, and Olivia nodded. Victoria could sense
easily that this conversation had to do with her transgression.

And in confirmation of that, he looked straight at Victoria as he went
further. "People are talking in New York, Victoria. There's very little
we can do about *, except ignore it, or deny it. And right now, I think
perhaps that silence is the only answer. People will be talking here
soon, after your recent trip to the hospital. And unfortunately, both
stories put together make an even uglier story.

They're beginning to say, fueled by Mr. Whitticomb, that you're a very
wanton girl, and in fact, not only badly behaved, but heartless.

Apparently, he's telling some sort of tale of your attempting to seduce
him. There are those who don't believe him of course, more than a few I
hope, but no matter what he says, or people do or do not believe, even
the truth is not a pretty story."

"I was foolish, Father, " Victoria said, admitting her guilt again, and
feeling weaker than she had in days, having to hear what he was saying.

"I was wrong .. . I was wanton, if you will .. . but I believed he loved
me."

"That only makes you stupid, rather than heartless, " he said unkindly,
which was unlike him. But he had not been pleased by her behavior in the
past several weeks, and he was frustrated by the realization that there
was very little he could do to fix it. He could do one thing at least,
and that he was determined to do now. "We can't change the stories very
much, I'm afraid, or silence Mr. Whitticomb.

But we can make you respectable again, at least, and the rest of us by
association.

I think you owe us that much."

"What could I possibly do, Father?

You know that I would do it." At that point, she would have done
anything to please him.

The force of his disappointment in her was a crushing weight she could
hardly bear now.

"I'm glad to hear that. You can get married, Victoria, and you will.

That will at least eventually stop the rumors. It will give people
something else to think about, and although you may have been a foolish
young girl, perhaps even the victim of a cad, it may be said one day,
you will at last be a respectable married woman, above reproach. And
eventually, people may well forget the other story. Without that
respectability, " he said, knitting his brows, and glaring at her
frighteningly, "there is only one story to tell, and it won't be a nice
one. It is the only story they'll hear or tell for years, and you will
in fact become a social pariah, and be treated like a harlot." He made
no bones about it, and both twins were staring at him in confusion, but
it was Victoria who answered.

"But he won't marry me, Father. You know that. He lied to me, he said so
himself. He never had any intention of marrying me. It was all a game to
him, " she told them what Toby had said to her the last time she saw
him, "and Evangeline is having another baby in the spring. He can't
possibly leave her."

"I should hope not." Her father looked awesome. "No, Tobias Whitticomb
will not marry you, Victoria. There is no doubt of that now.

But Charles Dawson will. We have spoken of it at length. He's a
reasonable, intelligent man. I believe him to be kind, and of good
morals, and he understands the situation. He has no delusions about your
feelings about him, and although he doesn't know the details, he
realizes that there was some unfortunate event that took place during
our recent stay in New York. He is a widower, he lost a wife he loved
deeply, and he himself is not seeking to replace her in his heart, but
he has a young son, and needs a mother for him.