Somerset (36 page)

“M
other, she's the spitting image of you,” Thomas said, turning the swaddled bundle in his arms to Jessica for her first peek at her granddaughter.

“Oh, dear,” Jessica said, peering into the well of pink blanket at the little red face of Regina Elizabeth Toliver.

“Now, now,” Thomas chided, his rebuke infused with the proud laughter of a father enchanted by his newborn infant. “I know you've never been happy with your fair skin and freckles and red hair, but Papa loved them, and so do I, and I will love them on this little angel.” He touched his lips to the diminutive forehead.

“Maybe she'll be spared my freckles,” Jessica said, doubting the hope and herself as the origin of the child's misfortune.

Thomas smiled down at his two-year-old son, who stood gripping his leg, the boy's upturned face filled with curiosity at the object in his father's arms that had so enraptured him. They were alone in the library. The Woodwards were upstairs with their daughter, and soon Priscilla's mother would swoop in to return the child to her daughter's breast.

“All right,” Thomas said, “it's your turn, Vernon. Come, let's sit down, and I will introduce you to your little sister.”

Jessica watched her tall son take a chair to facilitate her grandson's view of the first female born to a Toliver in twenty years. Thomas's joy in the child's gender was a surprise to her. He had hoped for a boy as a playmate for Vernon. Thomas made no bones about wanting Vernon to have many brothers. He had minded being an only child after Joshua's death and had demanded, “When am I going to have another brother like my friends?” before he was old enough to know not to ask such questions.

“Twenty years!” Priscilla had echoed when Thomas had informed her of the little-known fact of Toliver history after the doctor's announcement she'd given birth to a daughter. “That's an entire generation!”

“You have done what no other woman in the family has been able to accomplish in all that time,” Thomas said, fondly blotting his wife's wet hairline with a towel.

“You're not disappointed?” she asked. Priscilla lay exhausted in the birth bed after three hours of intense labor she'd borne with amazing fortitude and patience. Dr. Woodward's competitor had been called in to assist with the delivery and declared to Priscilla's father hovering anxiously in the hall that he had never seen a birthing mother so cooperative with Mother Nature.

“She really wants this baby,” he'd said.

Thomas said tenderly, “No, I'm not disappointed. I'm sorry I gave you the need to ask.”

“You wanted a son so badly.”

“I wanted another child. Given the sons born into the families around here, I didn't dare dream of becoming the father of a daughter.”

“You don't mind that she…doesn't look like either of us?” Priscilla asked.

“Not at all. She represents my mother's side of the family.”

“I'm so relieved you feel that way,” Priscilla said.

Jessica had listened to the conversation from a corner of the room (having yielded the attendant position at the side of her old bed to Priscilla's mother), and asked herself what difference did the child's paternity matter? What did family blood have to do with loving a child?

Everything, if Thomas ever suspects his daughter is not a limb off the Toliver tree, she had thought. So far he had perceived nothing. The attraction between Priscilla and Major Duncan appeared to have escaped his notice entirely. Not even the downturn of his wife's happy mood after the major's departure roused his suspicions. He blamed the destruction of the school. “She was so keen on her work there,” he'd said.

“I'm sure that's the explanation,” Jessica had remarked but was not surprised when Priscilla, using the excuse of her pregnancy, had rejected a request by the Freedmen's Bureau to resume her teaching duties in an abandoned warehouse until another facility could be built.

Paternity, blood, inherited links would matter to Thomas. Jessica felt the needles of a cold apprehension as she listened to him explain to Vernon his duties as a brother to his little sister. What if Thomas, for no particular reason, should have cause to wonder if the little redheaded girl he called his daughter was really his flesh and blood? What if, on some ordinary day as he observed Regina Elizabeth at play, bearer of his Queenscrown grandmother's name, he should unexpectedly recall Major Andrew Duncan and remember how his wife had come alive during his assignment in Howbutker? What if one thought led to another and on to another, and then suddenly, as surely as he was certain the sun would rise tomorrow, Thomas knew. That sort of instant awareness happened.

It had happened to her. Jessica remembered vividly the moment the realization struck her that Jeremy Warwick loved her beyond the breadth of friendship, though his attention would never stray outside its fraternal bounds. The families were playing croquet on the Warwicks' lawn, Jeremy paired with Jessica, Henri with Camellia, while Bess served the lemonade. Jeremy's ball sailed through the last wicket and hit the stake. He'd smiled at her. “We won,” he said, and in that second, like a shaft of sunlight revealing a secret passage in a familiar room, Jessica knew.

And Jeremy knew that Silas had known. That awareness was the reason Jeremy had asked her not to divulge to Silas as he was dying the secret of the money stored in Boston and how it got there.
Just trust me, Jess. In some ways I know your husband better than you. He would mind that you took me into your confidence over him and that I acted upon it without his knowledge.

But Silas had trusted their fidelity to him not to mind their special friendship, and so it would continue. She'd been shaken by the insight, but Jeremy would never learn of her perception that day. “Yes, we did,” she'd said, picking up the ball and waving it triumphantly at the others.

But, oh Lord, what a tragedy if Thomas discovered that Regina Elizabeth had been fathered by another man, and a Union officer to boot. There would be no picking up the pieces and putting them back together again—not for the marriage or for Thomas's relationship with his daughter.

“Poppies,” Vernon piped. “Her hair the color of poppies.”

“Then we will call her that, son. We'll call her Poppy.”

They made a beautiful picture, her glowing son and curious grandson huddled over the infant in Thomas's arms, a perfect subject for a portrait painter. Jessica wondered why she, as a member of the first generation, could not force herself to complete the scene.

“Come join us, Mother, before our little princess is taken from us.”

Thomas's invitation was interrupted by the opening of the library doors, and Petunia appeared. “Miss Priscilla sent me to collect the baby, Mister Thomas. It's her feeding time.”

Indeed, the child had begun to cry hungrily, tiny limbs flailing in the blanket. Reluctantly, Thomas handed the small bundle over to the maid. “Bring her back to me, Petunia,” he said. “I want her to know her father.”

Petunia shot a glance at Jessica, and Jessica slid hers away, her stomach curling. “As you say, Mister Thomas,” Petunia said.

Civil turmoil marked the rest of the spring and summer as Jessica approached her fiftieth birthday. Major Duncan's successor had been replaced by an iron-fisted general in charge of all the Union forces in Texas. Dissatisfied with the region's attempts to circumvent the directives Congress imposed on its political, social, and economic structure, the general took up residence in Howbutker and immediately inflamed the citizenry by removing its elected county officials and judges and replacing them with his appointees. Only those who took the government-mandated “Oath Test” stating they had never volunteered to bear arms against the United States or “given aid, countenance, counsel, or encouragement to persons engaged in armed hostility” could serve in public office. Thomas was removed immediately as head of the city council and Armand DuMont as mayor.

Those positions, along with others vacated by the commander's sweep, were filled with northern carpetbaggers, termed so because most arrived carrying all they possessed in fabric bags. These persons swooped in to buy destitute farms and plantations and cattle ranches at a fraction of the cost they would have had to pay for the same property and labor in northern states. The county warily and resentfully waited to see what control they would exert over the residents in their new positions of power.

An epidemic of yellow fever added to East Texas's miseries the year of 1867 and a new foliage-eating pest called the army worm came to harass cotton farmers. Suffocating in the heat with windows closed to keep out mosquitoes, Jessica thought of Secretary of State William Seward's purchase of Alaska from Russia that added 586,412 cold square miles to United States territory and wondered if it were possible to grow cotton there. The children were fretful, Thomas worried and irritable, Jessica weary from her depressing work in a charity hospital set up for Civil War veterans. Priscilla, on the other hand, appeared to have risen above it all, content on the cloud of her improved relations with her husband that gave her sway to exert more authority over the household.

“Whatever are you doing, Jessica?”

Jessica turned at the peremptory voice. Priscilla stood in the doorway of the pantry where Jessica had been counting the dwindling supply of staples still scarce after the war.

“Why…” Jessica said, annoyed that she had to explain herself, “I believe you can see for yourself that I'm checking the larder for the food goods we have left.”

“Isn't that my job?”

“It is if you would do it.”

“I've been busy with the children.”

“Which is why I'm doing it.”

Such exchanges were not uncommon between them. Gone was the infatuated, intimidated girl who had come to them wide-eyed at the elegance and refinement of her in-laws—and before the arrival of Major Andrew Duncan and the freeing of certain inhibitions, from which Thomas had benefited.

But October brought cooler weather and the announcement that Priscilla was again pregnant. A surprise visitor awaited Jessica the afternoon of her birthday. She was summoned to the parlor to find a spindle-limbed black woman of her age wearing one of the new princess gowns that eschewed crinolines and cages and gave her bantam, ungainly figure somewhat of a shape. The woman responded to Jessica's open-mouthed astonishment with a wide grin. “You didn't think I'd miss your fiftieth birthday, did you?” Tippy said.

T
he DuMonts had been responsible for arranging the surprise visit and feted the two women in a birthday bash in their château-like mansion that recalled celebrations of the prewar decade. The attire of the guests was noticeably less fashionable and worse for wear, and the hoopless, softly bustled gowns of Camellia Warwick, Bess DuMont, and Tippy stood out like bright carousel ponies on a weathered merry-go-round.

“The war has taken its toll,” Tippy commented later of the guests and the reduced number from Houston Avenue in attendance at the party.

“As Silas predicted,” Jessica said.

“I noticed the Davises were missing. Did they not come because I was one of the honorees?”

“They did not come because they're ashamed and extremely bitter over their diminished circumstances. I can understand and sympathize with their feelings to a point. They lost their son Jake in the war, such a sweet and good boy. Thomas and the boys miss him still. But Lorimer is responsible for his other losses. He fought Silas's prediction that the Confederacy would lose to the North tooth and toenail and continued to buy land and slaves—on credit—when all reason said to wait for the war's outcome. When he couldn't meet his mortgage payments, all his property passed into control of a commission house in Galveston, including his home on Houston Avenue. The army general in charge of the district has leased it for himself and his officers, a further bitter pill for the Davises to swallow. They are not alone in their grief. Countless other prominent plantation families throughout East Texas have suffered the same fate.”

Tippy shook her head sadly. “But Somerset has survived.”

Jessica shrugged. “Silas saw to its survival for the sake of Thomas, and Thomas will see to it for the sake of his son. At three, Vernon already appears to be of the same weft and warp as his father. He begs to go with him when he leaves in the morning, but who knows but that the boy prefers his father's company to a house full of women?”

“The boy is like him,” Tippy said in her familiar, prophetic voice.

Jessica felt the hairs rise on her forearms. She and Tippy were enjoying the fall sunshine on the front verandah where they had so often chatted, mindless of the neighbors' outrage over one of their own being seen sipping tea with a Negro. Jessica sniffed at their disdain. Those who'd managed to hold on to their homes on Houston Avenue, with the exceptions of the DuMonts and Warwicks, should feel so financially privileged and socially connected as Tippy. Isabel, as she was now called, had become one of the most sought-after fashion designers in America. Her dress and accessory creations, designed for the garment manufacturing firm in New York where she'd first been employed, had been an instant hit and led to other, even more lucrative offers of positions in the world of haute couture. To be called
haute couture
(translated by Tippy to mean “high sewing”), a fashion house had to belong to the Syndical Chamber for Haute Couture in Paris, regulated by the French Department of Industry. Tippy designed for the only establishment in America that could claim membership in that august body. Her clients included the female members of the Astor and Vanderbilt and Morgan families, and she had become friends with Sarah Josepha Hale, editor of the notable Godey's
Lady's Book
and an important and influential arbiter of American taste.

“I don't know that I wanted to hear that,” Jessica said, passing over the cream.

“That Vernon is like his father? Why not?”

Jessica stirred her tea. How to answer Tippy? Her quandary was the same as when she returned to her journal after a long absence and did not know where to begin, but, unlike the blank pages, Tippy would listen and respond. Her oldest and only woman confidante would be leaving in the morning, taking the train to New Orleans and on to New York accompanied by Jeremy, who had business in the city. Jessica had only a few remaining hours to take advantage of her counsel.

“Thomas followed in his father's footsteps and married a woman he did not love on behalf of Somerset,” Jessica said.

Tippy's eyebrows rose in concert. Like her hair, they were gray, thin, and wispy. “Thomas appears to be as fortunate in that respect as Silas was in marrying you,” she said.

“Oh, he's grown to care for Priscilla enough.”

Jessica heard a thump from inside the house near the parlor windows where they sat. The servants were moving furniture to clean the rugs. “Have you finished your tea?” she asked.

Tippy peered into the contents of her cup. “Does it matter?”

“No. Let's take a stroll about the garden. The Lancasters and Yorks are showing their best right now.”

Away from the house and the ears of the servants, Jessica told of the arrival of handsome and charismatic Major Duncan at a time when her son and daughter-in-law's marriage was at a low ebb. “It was obvious to everyone but Thomas that he was taken with her,” she said, “and I'm afraid my daughter-in-law, attention-starved that she was, succumbed to his…interest.”

“Did Thomas find out?”

“No, thank God. It was right after the war. He had lost his father and was taken up with many concerns.”

Tippy drew Jessica to a stop. “So what is the problem, Jessica? Their marriage seems none the worse, and from what you've said of Priscilla's frigidity, Major Duncan may have done Thomas a favor.”

“Oh, I'm not condemning the girl for her affair, if she had one, and it's not my son I'm thinking of.”

“Who then?”

“Regina Elizabeth.”

Comprehension flashed in the dark depths of Tippy's immense eyes like a trout breaking water. “You mean—”

“I do.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I'm not sure.” They were at the garden gate. Jessica unlocked it and they entered. “Major Duncan and Priscilla may have simply had an intense flirtation. He may have only made her feel good about herself, freed her fears about sex. I doubt that was all there was to it, but it's possible. Priscilla is an impressionable girl. But what if, by some quixotic quirk of fate, Thomas finds out about them? God have mercy! It would be worse than the house crashing around our ears. Thomas would never feel the same about the child. Tippy”—Jessica turned to her imploringly—“you know about these things. You're from the stars. Will we ever know for sure Regina is a Toliver?”

Tippy frowned as she reflected on the question. “I believe that in time all hidden things are revealed, Jessie, so yes, someday you'll know, but I hope it won't be too late for you to love her.”

Startled, Jessica said, “What makes you say that? Of course I love the child.”

“Not like you would if you knew for sure she carried your son's blood.”

Jessica turned away, shamefaced. “You always could see what others could not. Oh, God, Tippy. I'm so disgusted with myself, but I…When I look at her, I see the freckles and red hair of Major Duncan. I grew to dislike him. He took advantage of the situation and Priscilla let him. Even though I understand how and why it happened and no one seems the worse for it, I can't help but see the child as the fruit of their deceit.”

“You're a mother, Jessie. You believe Priscilla, understandably or not, was unfaithful to your son, and that would naturally color your feelings for her and the child, but look at how you love Amy, Petunia's daughter. She's not of your blood or even your race.”

“That is true, Tippy, but loving the child of a friend is not the same as loving a child of family. Regina is adorable, and I would never hold her mother's indiscretion against her, but I simply cannot feel for her the bond of blood I feel with Vernon.”

“You truly believe Regina is not Thomas's, don't you?”

“I can't shake the certainty of it, and you know I've never been one to give the benefit of the doubt where I believe there is none.”

Tippy shook her head sadly. “A pity, my dear, for Regina will love you the most and seek your approval above all others.”

Jessica looked over the red and white roses in her garden, their bobbing heads brilliant in the autumn sun. Would there ever come a time she would be forced to lay a red rose at her granddaughter's feet? Regina, at six months, was already showing signs of Tippy's prediction. Like the housecat that sought Jessica's company when she felt no particular affinity for felines, it was to her grandmother that Regina held out her arms from the crib and parlor floor, in Jessica's lap she stopped crying when no one else could console her.

“Thomas loves his son,” Jessica said, “but he worships his daughter, and so does Vernon. I don't want to think about their pain or Regina's if what I believe to be the truth is ever discovered.” She closed her eyes. “But for Somerset, Thomas would never have married Priscilla. I've always worried that there will be a reckoning for that decision somewhere along the way. I so hope it will not be Regina who'll bear the brunt of it.”

“No reckoning befell Silas for marrying you, Jessica.”

Jessica's mirthless laugh cut the crisp air like a knife. “Oh, but it did, Tippy. Oh, but it did.”