A Summer Affair (46 page)

Authors: Elin Hilderbrand

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BOOK: A Summer Affair

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Siobhan pictured herself the villainess in this story, then shivered. Awful. She was so absorbed in the thoughts of a horrible sinner that she did not notice Daphne Dixon coming out of the tent until Daphne was practically on top of her. What she saw only registered in the corner of her eye as a flare, a flame-colored blur. And that was what Siobhan meant by “fast”—one minute Siobhan was standing alone by the chandelier, contemplating the injustices of her life, and the next minute there was Daphne, drunk, stumbling out of the tent, headed for Siobhan. She looked like she wanted to tell Siobhan something—oh, dear Lord, what was she going to say?—or maybe she just needed someone to hold her up. Daphne was a lot bigger than Siobhan, and she had a frightening amount of momentum. She knocked into Siobhan, Siobhan knocked into the table, the table tilted, the chandelier slid to the ground. Crash, in the grass, and then whipped by its own chain.

Oh no, broken. So broken. Siobhan untangled herself from Daphne. Daphne got to her feet unsteadily; she took her shoes off—were her shoes the problem?—and staggered away.

“Daphne! Daphne, come back here!”

Daphne did not turn around, though she stumbled again. She was very drunk. Siobhan’s first thought was that she could not let Daphne get into a car. Siobhan chased Daphne out to the parking lot. She caught up to her and grabbed her arm.

“You’re not driving,” Siobhan said.

“It was an accident,” Daphne said. “Accident, accident, accident. Don’t worry. It wasn’t your fault.”

Siobhan tightened her grip on Daphne’s arm and flagged the security guard, who was threading his way through the parking lot. Should she tell him about the chandelier, smashed to bits in the grass? Who had knocked it over?
Don’t worry. It wasn’t your fault.
Damn right it wasn’t! But Siobhan had been standing in the wrong place; she should have been in the airless catering tent, doing dishes. Siobhan had the sick feeling it
was
her fault. Siobhan had knocked it over, right? She wasn’t sure; it had happened so fast.
Accident, accident, accident
. Yes, it was an accident. Claire and Siobhan should have absolutely insisted that Daphne get into a cab so many years ago. Claire had always felt guilty about that, but Siobhan hadn’t, though now Siobhan could see that Claire was right.
Don’t worry. It wasn’t your fault.
But it was their fault. Their inaction had been negligent, criminal. They had let Daphne drive home, despite the fact that she was wearing the lampshade. They might as well have handed her a loaded gun. If they had only stopped Daphne, everything now would be different.

Or would it?

“This woman needs a cab,” Siobhan said to the security guard. “She shouldn’t be driving.”

“I’m fine,” Daphne spat.

“Please put her in a cab,” Siobhan said. “She’s been drinking.”

The security guard wheeled Daphne toward the exit. “Will do. Ma’am, where do you live?”

Siobhan headed back to the tent, gravel crunching under her kitchen clogs. They were, all of them, sinners.

When Siobhan returned, the tent was rumbling with applause. She approached Hunter, at the bar, who was mopping up Ben Franklin’s drink.

“If anyone asks,” Siobhan said to Hunter, “tell them your back was turned.”

Hunter nodded.

Siobhan entered the back of the tent as Claire rose to accept her flowers. Siobhan would tell her what had happened later, privately. After all the hours Claire had devoted to the chandelier, it had taken only ten seconds to destroy. Less: five seconds, three seconds. How would Claire forgive her? (She would, Siobhan knew, because she was Claire.) Siobhan thought of the blue velvet bag in the secret compartment of her jewelry box, empty now. She had sold the ring for seventy-five hundred dollars—and donated it, anonymously, to Nantucket’s Children, even though she very much needed the money.
Carter!
What was Carter doing, right this second? Was he thinking of her, sensing her angst and torment—or was he stoned from throwing the dice? She had to get him help. But where? From whom? She would have to suck up the little pride she had left and ask Lock Dixon; he would have the answer. Forgiveness.

Siobhan closed her eyes and crossed herself:
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
It was all she could think of to do.

I
t was five minutes to ten and he was growing hoarse. That, really, was the worst effect of drinking before a show: he didn’t forget words or lose the melody, but his voice deteriorated. He still had two songs to sing.

He nuzzled the microphone. “This last song is for my . . . friend, Claire Danner.” The word “friend” was lame and insufficient, but he couldn’t very well tell a thousand of Claire’s friends and peers that he had fallen back in love with her. Still, he added, “When I wrote this song twenty years ago, I wrote it for her.” He looked down into the audience. Claire’s eyes were glassy. She blinked; tears fell. Matthew strummed the first chord, and the band eased into “Stormy Eyes.”

He wanted her to come up onstage; he wanted her to sing the last verse with him. Nobody realized this, but Claire could sing. High school chorus, soprano section. He tried to wave her up; she shook her head. She was dancing with Underwhelming Jason. Dick wasn’t around. Matthew felt hopeful.

At the end of “Stormy Eyes,” the concert was officially over. The lights went out. The crowd screamed. They wanted more. Matthew smiled. At a thousand dollars a ticket, he had expected a different crowd—more genteel, more reserved—but this group rivaled sixty thousand New Yorkers at Shea Stadium in the noise department.

“All right!” Matthew said into the microphone. He had an encore, one final song, and he had given it a lot of thought. He had, in fact, arranged for this song even before he arrived on the island. He had called each of the contract musicians himself—one second tenor, one baritone, one bass—and made sure they all knew barbershop.

Nobody would understand but her, and that was okay because she was the only one who mattered. He waited until the crowd grew quiet, absolutely silent, and then he hit the first, perfect note.

Sweet Rosie O’Grady
,
my dear little Rose.

It was how he’d gotten her before. It was all he had left.

And yes, she was smiling ear to ear, and yes, tears were streaming down her face, and yes, it was as though they were the only two people in the place—Matthew Westfield and Claire Danner, high school sweethearts from Wildwood Crest, New Jersey.

But as the quartet closed in on the end of the song, as their four voices blended with a beauty and a poignancy that Matthew himself could scarcely believe—
and Rosie O’Grady loves me!—
Claire looked him right in the eye and shook her head.

No,
she said.
I can’t.

Matthew clipped the note. The lights went out. The audience keened. He was intensely jealous then, as jealous as he’d ever been, not of Underwhelming Jason and not of Dick, but of having a life that you couldn’t, or didn’t want to, leave behind.

No,
he thought.
You shouldn’t.

It was time for him to go.

C
laire woke up to Jason kissing the back of her neck.

“What time is it?” she said.

“Six.”

“Too early.” She closed her eyes.

He let her sleep until nine, an unbelievable luxury. When she came out into the kitchen, the kids had all been fed and the breakfast dishes were washed. Pan was sitting on the sofa, reading to Zack. She was still spotted, but she felt better. Jason was standing at the counter, making sandwiches. Claire watched him in amazement: he lined up the bread and slathered one with mayo (Ottilie), one with mustard (J.D.), and one with mustard and butter (Shea). When he saw Claire, he stopped what he was doing and poured her a cup of coffee.

Claire kissed him and said, “Thank you for letting me sleep.”

“Picnic for the beach today,” he said.

“Okay,” Claire said. “Where’s Matthew?”

“He left.”

“He
left?
”

“His plane took off at seven. For Spain. I drove him to the airport.”

“He told me his flight was at ten,” Claire said. “He didn’t even say good-bye.”

Jason cleared his throat and started laying down slices of ham. “He told me to tell you he loves you, but that he understands.”

Claire nodded.

Jason closed the sandwiches, then sliced them with the big knife. “You pulled off a great event, despite everything. You should be proud of yourself, Claire.”

Claire took her coffee out to the back deck, stood at the railing, and looked out over the golf course. It was a glorious day.

Her head should have hurt, but it didn’t. Her heart should have hurt, but it didn’t, either. The chandelier was broken. On the way home from the gala, Claire had asked Jason to stop by the grocery store. Claire was about to toss the box into the Dumpster, but she found she couldn’t part with it so unceremoniously. The chandelier, broken or whole, represented a year of her life, and weren’t there things about the past year that had been valuable? Wasn’t there anything she could salvage? She could, she decided, salvage the chandelier. She thought of Mr. Fred Bulrush in San Francisco, for whom she had made the pulled-taffy candlesticks. She would repair the chandelier, and he would buy it. If it was lopsided, if it had hairline cracks, if it had dings and scars, if it contained a story of love and betrayal and ecstasy and regret, so much the better.
It’s like all of a sudden you don’t care about your soul. Stand in line together at the post office. You must pray for strength. We need someone who can give it a dedicated effort. There’s been an accident. O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended you, and I detest all my sins. They don’t know about the baby. I’ve been watching for you for
. . .
oh, about five days. Live with me. Marry me. When all this is over, do I get you back? He’s a walker! Ladies and gentlemen, Claire Danner Crispin!
. . .

It would mark her triumphant return.

Acknowledgments

V
irginia Woolf said it best: For a woman to write, she must have 500 pounds sterling and a room of her own. In other words, the time and the space.

For the time, I must first thank my au pair, Suphawan “Za” Intafa. Za can most accurately be described as an angel sent straight from heaven. There would be no book (indeed, no life) without Za. I’d also like to thank my mother, Sally Hilderbrand, who showed up in a time of “revising crisis” to bail me out. And while I’m at it, I’d also like to thank my grandmother Ruth Huling, who bailed my mother out over thirty years ago. I promise to follow their wonderful, selfless example and be there for my daughter, Shelby, when the time comes.

For the space, I’d like to thank Anne and Whitney Gifford for the keys to Barnabas. Barnabas was both an inspiration and a lifesaver. Thanks also to Jerry and Ann Longerot for their “cabin” on Lake Michigan in my final, desperate days of need.

Thank you to Mark Yelle, of Nantucket Catering Company (the man my children simply call “the Chef”), for explaining the ins and outs of the catering business. I borrowed all of Siobhan’s fabulousness from Eithne Yelle, though I will say, Siobhan is fictional(!).

I have the pleasure of sitting on three nonprofit boards on Nantucket—the Nantucket Boys & Girls Club, the Nantucket Preservation Trust, and the Friends of the Nantucket Public Schools. I have chaired events and chaired events, and I am happy to say those experiences have been enriching from start to finish. My appreciation goes out to Irene McMenamin Shabel and Mary Dougherty of Philadelphia, for sharing their wealth of information about philanthropy in the big city. The Arthur Ashe Youth Tennis and Education foundation doesn’t know how lucky it is!

In New York, thank you to my incomparable agents and muses, Michael Carlisle and David Forrer of Inkwell Management. They take incredibly good care of me. At Little, Brown, thank you to my editor, Reagan Arthur, for her insight, intelligence, and
patience
—and thank you also to Oliver Haslegrave, Michael Pietsch, and David Young. Across the pond, thank you to Ursula McKenzie and most especially Jo Dickinson, who made this a better book all the way around.

Finally, at home, I’d like to thank the people in my foxhole. First of all, “my soul mate, my darling, my defender, my reality check, and my partner in crime,” Amanda Congdon. And the beautiful women who, daily, lend me their friendship, laughter, and support: Elizabeth Almodobar, Margie Marino, Sally Bates Hall, Wendy Rouillard, Wendy Hudson, Rebecca Bartlett, Debbie Bennett, Leslie Bresette, Betty Dupont, Renee Gamberoni, Evelyn MacEachern, Holly McGowan, Nancy Pittman, the aforementioned Anne Gifford and Eithne Yelle, and my absolutely beloved Manda Riggs . A special thank-you to Mike Westwood—who will always be a rock star to me—for allowing me to grow up with love and friendship.

As ever, thank you to Heather Osteen Thorpe for the first, crucial read, and for checking in with me nearly every day.

As for my husband, Chip Cunningham, and our three children, Max, Dawson, and Shelby—what can I say? I’m yours once again.

About The Author

E
lin Hilderbrand lives on Nantucket with her husband and their three young children. She grew up in Collegeville, Pennsylvania, and traveled extensively before settling on Nantucket, which has been the setting for her six previous novels. Hilderbrand is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and the graduate fiction workshop at the University of Iowa.

Table of Contents

Prologue: The Invisible Thread That Binds Her To Him

PART ONE