My goal to get an early start was thwarted. I am not an early riser and Kit called me six more times to try to convince me to come to her party instead. Just as I was leaving, call number seven came in. I let the answering machine deal with it. Pushing my black suitcase out the door, I heard her say that if I was worried about not having a nice dress, she had an old one I could borrow. I slammed the door with more force than was strictly necessary and headed for my car.
By late afternoon, I was on the Cape. Directions in hand, I drove along the narrow, winding roads past scruffy pine trees and low walls of smooth gray stone, occasionally catching sight of the icy blue waters of Nantucket Sound. Above me, gnarled tree branches intermingled with power lines, both having been there so long it was hard to tell where one began and the other ended. My spirits rose at the sights, and some of my melancholy over Mark’s betrayal faded. After all, what are men to trees and rocks? Finally, I pulled into a curved tree-lined drive. At the end was a rambling two-story house. Hanging over the door was a freshly painted white sign. In large green letters it proclaimed: THE INN AT LONGBOURN. I smiled. Aunt Winnie was a dedicated, some might say an obsessed, fan of Pride and Prejudice.
As picturesque as it was, I had to admit that I had thought Aunt Winnie was crazy when she bought it several months earlier. She had seen the property while on a tour of Cape Cod and had impulsively decided to buy it, renovate it, and turn it into a B and B—regardless of the fact that she had absolutely no experience in anything of the sort. But Aunt Winnie seldom let logic interfere with her plans.
My aunt came bustling out the door just as I switched off the car’s engine. If your idea of a woman of seventy-odd years is of the genteel, blue-haired variety, then Aunt Winnie might be something of a shock. Her short, round figure was covered by a long coat that appeared to have been purloined from some off-off-Broadway production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. But bright as her coat was, it was nothing compared to her short, curly hair, currently colored an outrageous shade of red.
Aunt Winnie had never married, but that’s not to say that she hadn’t had offers. She used to joke that she thought marriage was a great institution, but that she didn’t want to be in an institution. I think her reluctance had more to do with her childhood than anything else. Her mother had died when she was young, and her father was a demanding hypochondriac who was convinced that his death was right around the corner. He withdrew to his room, where he fussed and moaned in glorious seclusion.
With his retreat, Aunt Winnie had been forced to run the family’s hardware store. Her two older brothers had left home years earlier and by then had their own careers to run. When her father finally did die six years later from pneumonia, no one was more surprised than he. But with his death, Aunt Winnie was free to live her own life. Taking her not insignificant inheritance to an investor, she ended up impressing that man with her business savvy and received a job offer instead. Over the next several years, Aunt Winnie worked and learned and continued to grow her inheritance until she was an extremely wealthy woman. The men who wanted to marry her always promised to “take her away from all of this,” a promise she found unappealing. She liked her work and she was good at it. So she turned them all down, had affairs instead, traveled, and made even more money.
“Elizabeth! Oh, it’s so good to see you,” she said now, giving me a tight hug. I happily returned it, breathing in the familiar scent of Chanel No. 5 that clung to her. “Let me get a look at you!” She held me at arm’s length and took a quick inventory. “You’re too thin, of course, but I guess that’s the style nowadays. I’m glad that in my day women were expected to have some curves.” Here she stopped to pat her own ample supply. “But you still look lovely—I’ve always said you’ve got the map of Ireland stamped on your face.” I laughed. The first time Aunt Winnie said that to me I was six years old and I instantly ran to the mirror to see if my freckles actually did form some sort of geographical pattern. As she helped me bring in my bag, she said, “So, I hear that you and your latest beau have broken up. Do I offer condolences or congratulations?”
“Definitely the latter,” I said. “To tell you the truth, I’m beginning to think that Mr. Darcy is just a fictional character.”
Aunt Winnie laughed. “He’s out there; you just haven’t met him. Yet.”
Something in her tone made me peer suspiciously at her. “What do you mean, yet? Aunt Winnie, please, please tell me you haven’t planned any surprises for this weekend. I’m really not in the mood for a blind date.”
“Blind date! Please! What sort of meddler do you think I am? A blind date, indeed!”
A contrite apology hovered on my lips until I realized that she was stressing the “blind” part a bit much. “Aunt Winnie,” I said, coming to an abrupt halt in the gravel driveway, “tell me now or I swear I will turn around this instant and go home.”
An expression of defiance tinged with guilt crossed her face. Finally, she tossed her chin, the movement sending her tight red curls quivering. “Well, now that you mention it,” she said casually, “there is someone here you know. Peter McGowan.”
At the sound of his name my stomach lurched. I think most people are emotionally frozen about someone or something—it may be that they are still intimidated by their third-grade teacher or continue to harbor a secret terror of clowns—but whatever it is, neither time nor maturity can break its power. For me that thing was Peter Emmett McGowan, intimidating elder and evil clown all rolled into one.
I met Peter the summer I turned ten. It was also the summer I obtained glasses, braces, and an extra fifteen pounds brought on by overeating to comfort myself about the aforementioned glasses and braces. Peter was fourteen going on seven and heir to a hugely successful hotel business. He had the easy confidence that money and good looks usually bring. He was also sneaky, cruel, and sadistic. I can’t count the number of hours I spent locked in some dark basement by his hands or the number of slimy bugs that “mysteriously” found their way down the back of my shirt. And, although the braces were gone, laser surgery had removed my need for glasses, and the weight problem was (more or less) under control, I still found myself pulling my coat tightly around my neck in a gesture that had nothing to do with the blustery weather.
“Aunt Winnie,” I began.
“Now, don’t squawk. Save your breath to cool your porridge. I asked him here to help me start up the inn. I needed somebody with experience in running this kind of business and Peter was kind enough to offer his services.”
Thinking that his experience would be far more suitable for a house of horrors, I made no reply and focused on keeping my face neutral. Apparently my mother was right when she told me that I didn’t have a poker face because Aunt Winnie continued as if I had spoken aloud.
“Peter’s a grown man now, Elizabeth. Besides, his parents are two of my dearest friends. You shouldn’t judge him for a few boyish pranks that happened more than fifteen years ago.”
“Don’t try to paint him as some Gilbert Blythe innocent. He locked me in a basement for two hours!”
“And you put a dead fish in his bed.”
I squelched my old familiar cry of “He started it!” and forced myself to act mature. When I saw Peter I would be polite and self-assured. I would have inner poise.
Right after I threw up.
To distract my mind from my roiling stomach, I took a restorative breath of the cold, salty air and turned my attention to the house. It really was quite perfect. Gray cedar shingles blanketed the large façade, including the veranda and bay windows, giving the impression of friendly bulges rather than separate features. Wide stone steps led to a deep porch that ran across the front. A few Adirondack chairs, painted cherry red, sat in cozy groupings. It made a charming and pretty picture. It was also totally useless in calming my nerves.