Garden of Shadows (Dollanganger) Read online

  “Then, if you will, let us return to your home so that I can speak to your father,” he said. He did take my arm and draw me closer to him. As we walked back to my father’s house, I thought about the couple I had seen strolling on the street that first night he came to dinner. My dream had come true. For the first time in my life, I felt truly happy.

  My father waited in his den as if he had anticipated the news. Things were moving so quickly. On more than one occasion, I had brought myself to the double doors that separated my father’s den from the sitting room and listened in on conversations. I resented being left out of some of the conversations anyway. They had to do with family affairs or business affairs that could affect me.

  Nothing would affect me more than the conversation that was about to ensue. I stood quietly to the side and listened, eager to hear Malcolm express his love for me.

  “As I told you the first night, Mr. Winfield,” he began, “I am quite taken with your daughter. It is rare to find a woman with her poise and dignity, a woman who can appreciate the pursuit of economic success and grow gracefully with it.”

  “I am proud of Olivia’s achievements,” my father said. “She is as brilliant an accountant and bookkeeper as any man I know,” he added. My father’s compliments always had a way of making me feel less desirable.

  “Yes. She’s a woman with a steady, strong temperament. I have always wanted a wife who would let me pursue my life as I will, and would not cling to me helplessly like a choking vine. I want to be confident that when I come home, she won’t be sulky or moody, or even vindictive as so many flimsy women can be. I like the fact that she is not concerned with superficial things, that she doesn’t dote on her own coiffure, that she doesn’t giggle and flirt. In short, I like her maturity. I compliment you, sir. You have brought up a fine, responsible woman.”

  “Well, I—”

  “And I can think of no other way to express that compliment better than to ask for your permission to marry her.”

  “Does Olivia …?”

  “Know that I have come in here to make this proposal? She has given me permission to do so. Knowing she is a woman of strong mind, I thought it best to ask her first. I hope you understand.”

  “Oh, I understand that.” My father cleared his throat. “Well, Mr. Foxworth,” he said. He felt it necessary to refer to him as Mr. Foxworth during this conversation. “I’m sure you understand as well that my daughter will come into a sizable fortune. I want you to know beforehand that her money will be her own. It is specifically stated in my will that no one but she will have access to those funds.”

  There was what I thought to be a long silence.

  “That’s as it should be,” Malcolm finally said. “I don’t know what your plans might be for a wedding,” he added quickly, “but I would favor a small church ceremony as quickly as possible. I need to return soon to Virginia.”

  “If Olivia wants that,” my father said. He knew that I would.

  “Fine. Then I have your permission, sir?”

  “You understand what I have said about her money?”

  “Yes, sir, I do.”

  “You have my permission,” my father said. “And we’ll shake on it.”

  I released the air that I held in my lungs and stepped quickly away from the double doors.

  A man, most handsome and elegant, had come calling and then had asked for my hand in marriage. I had heard it all and it had all happened so quickly, I had to catch my breath and keep telling myself it wasn’t a dream.

  I hurried upstairs and sat before the dollhouse. I would live in a big house with servants and there would be people coming and going. We would entertain with elaborate dinner parties and I would be an asset to my husband who was, as my father had said, something of a business genius. In time we would be envied by all.

  “Just like I have envied you,” I said to the porcelain family within the glass.

  I looked about me.

  Good-bye to lonely nights. Good-bye to this world of fantasy and dreams.

  Good-bye to my father’s face of pity and to my own forlorn look in the mirror. There was a new face to know—and so much to learn about Malcolm Neal Foxworth—and a lifetime to learn it in. I was to become Olivia Foxworth, Mrs. Malcolm Neal Foxworth. All my mother had predicted had come true.

  I was blooming. I felt myself opening out toward Malcolm like a tightly closed bud bursting into blossom. And when his blue, blue eyes looked into my gray ones, I knew the sun had come and melted the fog away. My life would no longer be colored gray. No, from now on it would be blue—blue as the sun-filled skies of a cloudless day. Blue as Malcolm’s eyes. In the flush of being swept away by love, like any foolish schoolgirl I forgot all I knew about caution and looking beyond appearances to see the truth. I forgot that never once when Malcolm proposed to me and then made his proposal to my father had he mentioned the word “love.” Like a foolish schoolgirl I believed I would lie beneath the blue sky of Malcolm’s eyes, and my tiny little blossom would grow into a sturdy, long-lasting bloom. Like any woman stupidly believing in love, I never realized that the blue sky I saw was not the warm, soft, nurturing sky of spring, but the cold, chilling, lonely sky of winter.

  2

  My Wedding

  THERE WERE SO MANY PLANS TO BE MADE AND SO LITTLE time to plan. We decided to have the wedding two weeks hence. “I’ve been away quite a long time,” Malcolm explained, “and I have many pressing business concerns. You don’t mind a bit, do you, Olivia? After all, we shall have our whole lives from now on to be together, and we shall have a honeymoon later, after you’re all settled in at Foxworth Hall. Do you agree?”

  How could I not agree? The size of my wedding, the abruptness of it, did not lessen my excitement. I kept telling myself I was lucky to have this one. Besides, I was never comfortable being on display in front of people. And I really had no friends to celebrate with. Father invited my mother’s younger sister and her child, John Amos, our only living close relatives. “Poor relations,” my father always called them. John Amos’s father had died several years before. His mother was a dark drab thing, seemingly still in mourning after all these years. And John Amos, at eighteen, seemed already old. He was a hard, pious young man who always quoted the Bible. But I agreed with Father that it was only appropriate that we invite them. Malcolm brought no one. His father had recently begun traveling and intended to visit many countries and travel for a number of years. Malcolm had no brothers or sisters and apparently no close relations he cared to invite or, as he explained, who could come on such short notice. I knew what people would think about that—he didn’t want his family to see what he was marrying until it was too late. They might talk him out of it.

  He did promise to hold a reception at Foxworth Hall soon after we arrived.

  “You’ll meet anyone of consequence there,” he said.

  The next two weeks for me were filled with arrangements and fears. I decided I would wear my mother’s wedding gown. After all, why spend so much money on a dress you would wear only once? But, of course, the gown was much, much too short for me and Miss Fairchild, the dressmaker, had to be called in to lengthen it. It was a simple dress of pearly silk, not full of frippery, lace, and doodads, but stately, beautiful, elegant, just the sort of dress Malcolm would appreciate, I thought. The dressmaker frowned as I stood on a bench; the dress reached only my mid-calves. “My dear Miss Olivia,” she sighed, looking up at me from where she knelt on the floor, “I’m going to have to be a genius to hide this hem. Are you certain you don’t want a new dress?”

  Oh, I knew what she was thinking. Who’s marrying this tall, gangly Olivia Winfield, and why does she insist on squeezing herself into her dainty mother’s dress like one of Cinderella’s stepsisters trying to get into the glass slipper? And perhaps I was. But I needed to be close to my mother on my wedding day, as close as I could get. And I felt protected in her dress, protected by the generations of women who had married men and borne them children
before me. For I knew and understood so little of any of this. And I wanted to be beautiful on my wedding day, no matter how much pity and mockery I saw in the dressmaker’s eyes. “Miss Fairchild, I must wear Mother’s wedding dress for scores of sentimental reasons I’m sure it is not necessary to explain to you. Now, can you lengthen this dress or shall I have to call in someone else?” I put coldness in my voice and superior social standing in my posture and Miss Fairchild was back in her place. She did the rest of her work in silence, as I gazed in the mirror. Who was that woman gazing back at me—a bride in a white dress. A bride about to be taken by a man and made his own. And what would it feel like, to walk down the aisle. Oh, I knew my heart would stampede like wild horses. I’d try to smile, to make my face as sweet as the bride atop the wedding cake, as sweet as the faces of the young wives I saw in the society columns in the newspapers.

  How could they look so sweet and innocent? Surely, they didn’t go through their whole life looking like that. Was it something they learned or something that came naturally? If it was something learned, maybe there was hope for me. Maybe I could learn it too.

  But still I’d be as shy as ever, knowing what people were thinking—she’s so tall and her arms are so long. That beautiful head of hair is wasted atop that plain face. Even if I smiled back at them and they smiled and nodded at me, I knew they would be turning to one another immediately afterward, quiet laughter around their eyes. How foolish she looks. Those shoulders in such a dainty wedding dress. Those big feet. Look how she towers over everyone but Malcolm.

  And Malcolm, so handsome and stately standing beside such an ugly duckling. Oh, people would have so much fun making jokes about the eagle and his pigeon, one bird magnificent, beautiful, and proud; the other plain, awkward, drab.

  As I stood before the mirror and Miss Fairchild busied herself about my body with needles and pins and basting threads, I was happy that my wedding would be attended only by Aunt Margaret and John Amos, my father, Malcolm, and myself. No one would be there to make my worst fears come true, and I hoped that now my chance had come, my brightest rainbow dreams would be mine to claim.

  On my wedding day it rained. I had to run into the church with my white dress covered by a gray raincloak. But, disappointing as it was, I would not let the weather dampen my excitement. We had a simple church service in the Congregational Church. As I started down the aisle, I hid my fears and nervousness behind a mask of solemnity. Wearing this face, I was able to look directly at Malcolm as I walked down the aisle to meet him. He stood waiting at the altar, his posture stiff, his face more solemn than mine. That disappointed me. I was hoping when he saw me in my mother’s wedding dress, something of the magic would occur again and his would light with pleasure, anticipating our love. I searched his eyes. Was he hiding his true feelings behind the same mask I was? When he looked at me, he seemed to be looking right through me. Perhaps he thought it would be sinful to show desire and affection in church.

  Malcolm pronounced his wedding vows so emphatically that I thought he sounded more like the minister than the minister did. I couldn’t keep my heart from thumping. I feared my voice would tremble when I pronounced the vows, but my voice did not betray me as I vowed to love, honor, and obey Malcolm Foxworth till death us did part. And as I pronounced these words, I meant them with all my heart and all my soul. In the eyes of God I meant them and in the eyes of God I never broke them my entire life. For whatever I did for Malcolm, I did to please God.

  When we had completed our vows and exchanged our rings, I turned to Malcolm expectantly. This was my moment. Gently he lifted the veil from my face. I held my breath. There was a deep silence in the church; the world seemed to be holding its breath as he leaned toward me, his lips approaching mine.

  But Malcolm’s wedding kiss was hard and perfunctory. I expected so much more. After all, it was our first kiss. Something should have happened that I would remember for the rest of my life. Instead, I barely felt his taut lips on mine before they were gone. It was more like a stamp of certification.

  He shook hands with the minister; he shook hands with my father. My father hugged me quickly. I suppose I should have kissed him, but I was very self-conscious about the way John Amos was looking at us. I saw it in his face—he was as disappointed in Malcolm’s kiss as I was.

  My father looked pleased, but terribly thoughtful as we all left the church together. There was something in his look that I had never seen before, as I caught him gazing up at Malcolm from time to time. It was as though he saw something new, something he had just realized. For a moment, only a moment, that frightened me; but when I looked his way, happiness washed the darkness from his eyes and he smiled softly the way he sometimes smiled at my mother when she did something that pleased him a great deal or when she looked especially beautiful.

  Did I finally look beautiful, even if just for today? Did my eyes sparkle with new life? I hoped this was true. I hoped Malcolm felt it too. My father suggested we all adjourn quickly to our home, where he had planned a small reception. Of course, how large could a reception be, with only a bride and groom, a father, a grieving aunt, and a boy of eighteen. But reception it was as Father brought out a bottle of vintage champagne. “Olivia, my dear and only daughter, and Malcolm, my distinguished new son-in-law. May you live in happiness and harmony forever.” Why did a tear squeeze from his eye as he raised his glass toward us? And why did Malcolm look at Father rather than at me as he drank his champagne? Suddenly I felt lost, not knowing what to do, so I turned up my glass and over the rim saw my cousin, John Amos, scowling at Malcolm. Then he walked over to me.

  “You look beautiful today, Cousin Olivia. I want you to remember, you are my only family, and whenever you need me, I will be there for you. For God planned families always to stick together, always to help one another, always to keep his sacred trust of love.” I didn’t know how to respond. Why, I barely knew this young man. And what a thing to say on my wedding day. What in heaven’s name could John Amos, the poor relation, ever hope to do for me, who was headed for a life of Southern gentility filled with wealth and ambition? What, indeed, did he know, even then, that it took me too long to discover?

  Malcolm had booked passage for us on the train leaving at three that day. We were going right to Foxworth Hall. He said he had no time for a prolonged honeymoon and saw no practical sense in it anyway. My heart sank in disappointment when he told me that, yet at the same time I felt relieved. I’d heard enough stories about men and their wedding nights, about a woman’s duty to her husband, that I had no wish to prolong my ordeal of initiation. Frankly, I was terrified at the idea of conjugal relations, and somehow, knowing we’d be traveling through the night, safe on a cozy train with people all around us, set my mind at ease.

  “For you, coming to Foxworth will be romantic adventure enough, Olivia. Trust me,” he said as if my face had turned to glass and he could read my thoughts within.

  I didn’t complain. The description he had given me of Foxworth Hall made it sound like a fairy tale castle so grand and fascinating it would make my dollhouse dream of beauty seem ant-sized.

  At precisely two-fifteen Malcolm announced that it was time for us to get started. The car was brought around and my trunks were loaded.

  “You know,” my father told Malcolm as we left the house, “I’ll have to do my dandiest to find an accountant as good as Olivia.”

  “Your loss is my gain, sir,” Malcolm replied. “I assure you, her talents will not go unused at Foxworth Hall.”

  I felt as if they were talking about some slave who had been exchanged.

  “Perhaps my wages will be improved,” I said. I half meant it to be a joke, but Malcolm didn’t laugh.

  “Of course,” he said.

  My father kissed me on the cheek and looked sad when he said, “You take good care of Malcolm, now, Olivia, and don’t give him any trouble. Now Malcolm’s word is law.” Somehow that frightened me, especially when John Amos popped up, grabbed my hand,
and said, “The Lord bless you and keep you.” I didn’t know how to respond, so I just thanked him, pulled my hand away, and got in the car.

  As we drove away, I looked back at the Victorian house that had been more than a home to me. It had been the home of my dreams and my fantasies; it had been the place from which I had looked out at the world and wondered what would be in store for me. I had felt safe there, secure in my ways and in my room. I was leaving my glass-encased dollhouse, with its tinted windows and rainbow magic, but I would no longer need it to dream on. No, now I would live in the real world, a world I could never have imagined existed in that precious dollhouse world that had formed my hopes and dreams.

  I took Malcolm’s arm and moved closer to him. He looked at me and smiled. Surely, I thought, now that we were alone, he would be more demonstrative of his love and affection.

  “Tell me again about Foxworth Hall,” I said, as if I were asking him to tell me a bedtime story about another magical world. At the mention of his home, he straightened up.

  “It’s over one hundred and fifty years old,” he said. “There’s history in it everywhere. Sometimes I feel as if I am in a museum; sometimes I feel as if I am in a church. It’s the wealthiest home in our area of Virginia. But I want it to be the wealthiest in the country, maybe even the world. I want it to be known as the Foxworth castle,” he added, his eyes becoming coldly determined. He went on and on, describing the rooms and the grounds, his family’s business and his expectations for them. As he talked on, I felt as if I were descending deeper and deeper into his ambitions. It frightened me. I hadn’t realized how monomaniacal he could be. His whole body and soul fixed itself on his goals and I sensed that nothing, not even our marriage, was more important to him.