Ansley promised never to tell.
26
But she did. She told Samson.
The early afternoon sun slanted across Blair Bainbridge’s large oak kitchen table. Tulips swayed outside the long windows, and the hyacinths would open in a few days if this welcome warmth continued.
“I’m not surprised,” Samson told Ansley. “The old man made a lifetime study of bloodlines, and to him it would be like crossing a donkey with a Thoroughbred.” Then he smirked. “Of course, who is the donkey and who is the Thoroughbred?”
She held his hand as she sipped her hot chocolate.“It seems so—extreme.”
Samson shrugged. The contents of Wesley’s will held scant interest for him. Another twenty minutes and he would have to hit the road. His stomach knotted up each time he left Ansley. “Say, I’ve got people coming in from California to look at Midale. Think I’ll show them some properties in Orange County too. Awful pretty up thereand not so developed. If I can sell Midale, I’ll have some good money.” He pressed his other hand on top of hers. “Then you can leave Warren.”
Ansley stiffened.“Not while he’s in mourning for his father.”
“After that. Six months is a reasonable period of time. I can set my house in order and you can do the same.”
“Honey”—she petted his hand—“let’s leave well enough alone—for now. Lulu will skin you alive and in public. There’s got to be a way around her, but I haven’t found it yet. I keep hoping she’ll find someone, she’ll make life easier—but she has too much invested in being the wronged woman. And that scene at Big Daddy’s funeral. My God.”
Samson coughed. The knot in his stomach grew tighter.“Just one of those things. She leaned over to whisper in my ear and said she smelled another woman’s perfume. I don’t know what got into her.”
“She knows my perfume, Diva. Anyway, when we’re together I don’t wear any perfume.”
“Natural perfume.” He kissed her hand in his.
She kissed him on the cheek.“Samson, you are the sweetest man.”
“Not to hear my wife tell it.” He sighed and bowed his head. “I don’t know how much longer I can stand it. I’m living such a lie. I don’t love Lulu. I’m tired of keeping up with the Joneses, who can’t keep up with themselves. I’m tired of being trapped in my car all day with strangers and no matter what they tell you they want to buy, they really want the opposite. I swear it. Buyers are liars, as my first broker used to say. I don’t know how long I can hold out.”
“Just a little longer, precious.” She nibbled on his ear. “Was there another woman’s perfume on your neck?”
He sputtered,“Absolutely not. I don’t even know where she came up with that. You know I don’t even look at other women, Ansley.” He kissed her passionately.
As she drew back from the kiss she murmured,“Well, she knows, she just doesn’t know it’s me. Funny, I like Lulu. I call her most every morning. I guess she’s my best friend, but I don’t like her as your wife and I never did. I couldn’t get it, know what I mean? You can sometimes see a couple and know why they’re together. Like Harry and Fair when they were together. Or Susan and Ned—that’s a good pair—but I never felt the heat, I guess you’d say, between Lulu and you. I don’t really feel like I’m betraying her. I feel like I’m liberating her. She deserves the heat. She needs the right man for her—you’re the right man for me.”
He kissed her again and wished the clock weren’t ticking so loudly. “Ansley, I can’t live without you. You know that. I’ll never be as rich as Warren, but I’m not poor. I work hard.”
Her voice low, she brushed his cheek with her lips as she said,“And I want to make sure you don’t join the ranks of the nouveau pauvre. I don’t want your wife to take you to the cleaners. Give me a little time. I’ll think of something or someone.” She leapt out of her chair. “Oh, no!”
“What?” He hurried to her side.
Ansley pointed out the kitchen window. Mrs. Murphy and Tucker merrily raced to the stable.“Harry can’t be far behind, and she’s no dummy.”
“Damn!” Samson ran his hands through his thick hair.
“If you slip out the front door I’ll go out to the stable and head her off. Hurry!” She kissed him quickly. She could hear the heels of his shoes as he strode across the hardwood floors to the front door. Ansley headed for the back screen door.
Harry, much slower than her four-footed companions, had just reached the family cemetery on the hill. Ansley made it to the stable before Harry saw her.
“What’s she doing in Blair’s house?” Tucker asked.
Mrs. Murphy paused to observe Ansley.“High color. She’s het up about something and we know she’s not stealing the silver. She’s got too much of her own.”
“What if she’s a kleptomaniac?” Tucker cocked her head as Ansley walked toward them.
“Nah. But give her a sniff anyway.”
“Hi there, Mrs. Murphy. You too, Tucker,” Ansley called to the animals.
“Ansley, what are you up to?” Tucker asked as she poked her nose toward Ansley’s ankles.
Ansley waved at Harry, who waved back. She reached down to scratch Tucker’s big ears.
“Hi, how nice to find you here.” Harry diplomatically smiled.
“Warren sent me over to look at Blair’s spider-wheel tedder. Says he wants one and maybe Blair will sell it.”
A spider-wheel tedder turns hay for drying and can row up two swathes into one for baling. Three or four small metal wheels that resemble spiderwebs are pulled by a tractor.
“Thought you all rolled up your hay.”
“Warren says he’s tired of looking at huge rolls of shredded wheat in the fields and the middle of them is always wasted. He wants to go back to baling.”
“Be a while.” Harry noted the season.
Ansley lowered her voice.“He’s already planning Thanksgiving dinner for the family. I think it’s how the grief is taking him. You know, if he plans everything, then nothing can go wrong, he can control reality—although you’d think he would have had enough of that with his father.”
“It will take time.” Harry knew. She had lost both her parents some years before.
Mrs. Murphy, on her haunches, got up and trotted off toward the house.“She’s lying.”
“Got that right.” The dog followed, her ears sweeping back for a moment.“Let’s nose around.”
The two animals reached the back door. Tucker, nose straight to the ground, sniffed intently. Mrs. Murphy relied on her eyes as much as her nose.
Tucker picked up the scent easily.“Samson Coles.”
“So that’s it.” Mrs. Murphy walked between the tulips. She loved feeling the stems brush against her fur.“She must really be bored.”
27
The quiet at Eagle’s Rest proved unnerving. Ansley regretted saying how much she loathed the loud music the boys played. Although cacophonous, it was preferable to silence.
Seven in the evening usually meant each son was in his room studying. How Breton and Stuart could study with that wall of reverberating sound fascinated her. They used to compete in decibel levels with the various bands. Finally she settled that by declaring that during the first hour of study time, from six to seven, Stuart could play his music. Breton’s choice won out between seven and eight.
Both she and Warren policed what they called study hall. Breton and Stuart made good grades, but Ansley felt they needed to know how important their schoolwork was to their parents, hence the policing. She told them frequently,“We have our jobs to do, you have your schoolwork.”
Unable, at last, to bear the silence, Ansley climbed the curving stairway to the upstairs hall. She peeked in Breton’s room. She walked down to Stuart’s. Her older son sat at his desk. Breton, cross-legged, perched on Stuart’s bed. Breton’s eyes were red. Ansley knew not to call attention to that.
“Hey, guys.”
“Hi, Mom.” They replied in unison.
“What’s up?”
“Nothing.” Again in unison.