The Wildest Heart (5 page)

To say I was slightly stunned at the end of Mr. Braithwaite's recital would be an understatement. I had made some study of the law, among other things, mainly because I knew Latin and wanted to practice it as much as possible, but my father's will and his instructions were simply, yet concisely, drawn up, leaving no loopholes.

“Whoever Guy's attorney in Boston is—this Judge Fleming—he's a good man. Makes everything clear, does he not? Do you have any questions now, Lady Rowena?”

I was amazed, even slightly dazed, by the sudden change in my fortunes, and my somewhat ambiguous status. Because I was used to thinking before I spoke, I was silent for a few moments after Mr. Braithwaite had spoken, and he repeated his question, giving me an understanding smile.

“It's something of a shock, eh? Not surprising. I understand you believed your father to have dropped completely out of sight, or to have forgotten your existence? Well, the letter explains it all, of course. Your grandfather”—he sighed—“well, in his way he was a hard man. Unforgiving. You understand everything now, do you not? Guy Dangerfield—the Earl of Melchester, I should say—is a sick man. No, let us be frank, he's a dying man, and he knows it. That is why there is a reason for haste. He wishes very much to see you before he dies. I don't wish to press you, of course, for I realize what a shock this must all be to you, but—” I heard my mother's sharply indrawn breath and knew she was watching me, her eagerness to hear my answer almost a palpable thing.

But I already knew what my answer would be. I had known it when I agreed to come here—even before I discovered the extent of my suddenly acquired fortune. I was free! Amazingly, unexpectedly, I had been set free, granted independence. From now on I need belong to no one, answer to no one but myself.

I leaned forward and heard my own voice say in level, perfectly composed tones, “But of course I agree, Mr. Braithwaite. To all the conditions outlined in the will and my father's letter, as well as to the need for haste. I shall be ready to leave England as soon as you can make the arrangements.”

“We will not say anything of this to Edgar,” my mother said flatly when we were in the carriage again. She had signed all the necessary papers relinquishing her guardianship of me, and now she met my eyes coldly, as if she had already said her good-byes to me. “Mr. Braithwaite said it would take about a week. It was fortunate that he had the forethought to reserve a passage for you on that American ship, just in case you agreed to go. There's no need for—for any unpleasantness before you leave. Best to do it this way.”

I shrugged wearily, still occupied with my thoughts. “As you please,” I said indifferently. “I shall leave it to your ingenuity to get Sir Edgar out of the way on the day I'm supposed to depart. And you'll have a week to think of some explanation to give him.”

“That will be my affair,” she said harshly, and we conversed no more for the rest of the journey back.

I had much to think about. Not only was I to start off upon a journey that would take me to a whole new life, but I had a father at last, and he actually wanted me! I remembered Nanny's words—“He fair doted upon you, he did”—and found myself wondering, for the first time, how my father had got on after his return to America. Forced to leave England under a cloud, leaving both wife and daughter behind, denied all communication with me afterwards—it had been fair to neither of us, but of course, my grandfather had believed he was doing what was best for me.

I would not waste time on regrets for what was past and done with; that much, at least, I had learned. And I did not think that anyone but Sir Edgar would regret my departure. I know that the servants whispered about me, even Mrs. Jenks, who positively fawned upon me in the hopes I'd recommend her devotion to Sir Edgar. And Mellyn, who was bluntly outspoken because of her age and privileged position, had been pensioned off at Sir Edgar's insistence, because he was afraid she would “kick up an ugly fuss” as he put it, when she discovered what was going on under her “poor baby's” very nose. Well, Nanny could come back now, and no doubt, after his first rage was over, Edgar would play the dutiful and loving husband again, keeping his mistresses in the discreet little apartment off Curzon Square.

Everything would settle down to normal again, just as it had been before I arrived; and I—but things would be different for me this time, I vowed to myself. I had learned my lessons in survival as diligently as I had once studied my books that taught me of abstracts. Soon, when I was on my own, I would have the chance to see how well I remembered these lessons.

There was nothing to do now, but to wait. The carriage pulled up before Sir Edgar's imposing town house, and my mother and I, incongruous co-conspirators, alighted in silence without glancing at each other.

Upstairs in my room, Martine was waiting for me.

“We have been shopping, but I did not see anything that I wanted,” I told her casually, and dismissed her on the pretext that I was tired and would rest again before dinner. Poor Martine. What would she do when I was gone? I told myself that I must leave her an excellent letter of recommendation, and perhaps a bonus of fifty pounds to take care of her until she found another position. It would be more than she would earn in two years, but what did fifty pounds matter to me now? In my reticule I carried a packet of carefully folded bank notes, amounting to well over five hundred pounds—money for “incidentals,” Mr. Braithwaite had called it. My father, it seemed, had been insistent that I must lack for nothing. I had also been given a letter that authorized me to draw as much money as I needed out of my father's banks in Boston and New York. I was really an heiress, after all!

I sat at my small Chippendale desk—another gift from Sir Edgar, who had allowed me to refurnish my room according to my own tastes—and carefully opened the sealed envelope I had taken out of my reticule. The writing on the front was in black ink—a rather spidery, unfamiliar scrawl. “To my Daughter, Rowena Elaine Dangerfield.” Now, at last, I would learn something about my father, from himself.

My fingers trembled as I drew out the stiff, crackling sheets of paper. My father. Strange that I, who had so carefully taught myself to suppress all outward show of emotion, should suddenly feel almost moved. Strange too, that even before I began to read, I should feel a sense of familiarity, even of closeness.

My Dearest Daughter,

It must surely seem as strange to you to read this letter from me as it seems for me to be writing to you at last, knowing that you will be reading this letter. And yet we are hardly strangers. I do not refer only to the tie of blood that binds us, but to the fact that you have never been far from me in my thoughts. Whatever you have been told about me, I hope you will believe this much at least; that I love you, as I loved you ever since I first held you as a tiny, squalling scrap of humanity, your eyes tightly screwed shut, and on your head a thatch of black hair that had to come to you from me. My daughter!

I felt closer to you, in that moment, than I have ever felt to any other human being…

My eyes moved down the closely written pages, reading more slowly than was my wont. My father had not wasted too much space in explanations, or reasons for our long separation, except to tell me that it had not been of his own will or doing. He had kept journals, which I would be able to read someday. They would explain everything.

I have tried to envision New Mexico through your eyes—as I saw it first. A savage, beautiful land of contrasts. Perhaps, since you have lived in India, the transition will not prove too difficult. You see, I am already taking it for granted that you will come here. I have begun to hope again, to make plans….

Further down he had written,

I have spoken to Todd of my plans. He does not believe that you will want to live here. He does not understand. How can he? I feel that I know you, in spite of everything; it is more instinct that tells me this than anything else. But to satisfy Todd, I have included certain stipulations in the will I have drawn up. Whether you decide to make your home in New Mexico or not, you will be amply provided for, as I am sure Samuel Braithwaite will have made very clear to you. If, before a year is up, you decide you would rather make your home elsewhere, the SD Ranch will be all Todd's—but even now, when I have been forced to realize that I am a dying man, I have hopes that I will live long enough to see you again, to talk to you, and explain all that you will have to face when I am gone. I have certain requests to make of you—they are requests only. I think, when you have read my journals, you will understand why I make them. But I would make another request of you, my daughter, and that is that you read my journals in sequence…

I was to get in touch with a man named Elmer Bragg when I arrived in Boston. “An ex-Pinkerton man,” my father called him. “A frontier lawyer with the soul of a scholar—or perhaps a prophet. Elmer chooses his clients since he had retired, but he is one of my closest friends, and if I am unable to meet you, it is my wish that you will contact him.”

The letter was signed “Your loving Father, Guy Dangerfield.”

I thought about my mother, whom I had known these past two years, and for whom I could feel nothing but a vague kind of dislike. I had hated her at times, but I was beyond that violent emotion now. She was a poor, wily woman, the product of her environment and upbringing. I was more my father's daughter than I was hers, and she, oddly enough, had realized it first.

I had passed the time for looking back! The thought came to me with a kind of violence, bringing me to my feet, and to the mirror again, where I looked at my reflection with a feeling of wonderment, remembering myself when I had first come here. It was a different Rowena Dangerfield who would be traveling to America—not a girl, but a woman.

“It is better this way,” my mother said, as she rode opposite me in the carriage. It was our first real conversation since we had spoken of my new life a week ago, and now we were on our way to the docks. “You'll get on in America, I'm sure,” she went on, her eyes flickering over me. “Guy should have been allowed to have you, of course. I see that now. But at the time your grandfather was insistent, and I had no choice in the matter. I was forced to go abroad for a while. The scandal was really terrible. I wasn't prepared for any of it—then.”

“I'm sure Sir Edgar went with you,” I said idly, and saw her eyes narrow.

“Yes, he did! But then, it is not something you would understand. You have never felt deeply about anything, or anyone, have you? Oh, I see you raise your eyebrows. I know what you think about me. But you have never loved. I wonder if you are capable of it! I might have—I might have felt something for you, even if it was only pity, if I hadn't recognized how hard you are, under that indifferent surface!”

“What is the point of saying this to me now?”

She leaned forward, and her mouth, usually soft and pouting, was hard. “It has to be said! I know you never loved Edgar. You never felt anything for him, did you? And perhaps it was for that very reason that he became so—besotted—obsessed! You saw him merely as a man you had maneuvered into an awkward position, and then you used him, did you not? But I love him. Yes, look at me any way you want to. You may think me a silly, stupid woman, but at least I'm capable of feeling! He had his mistresses when we first met, and he had them afterwards, but he married me. It didn't matter until you came. Guy's daughter—Guy's revenge!”

I said coldly, “How unfortunate that you had me at all! And how awkward of my grandfather to die so soon.”

“Oh, yes,” my mother said a trifle wildly. It seemed as if she was suddenly determined to have her say. “Yes,” she added, in a lower voice. “You would not understand, but I was only seventeen. What did I know of love or marriage at the time? It was all arranged. I was to be married to Guy Dangerfield, who was so much older than I was, a man I had met only twice before. It was what I had been brought up for, after all. To make an advantageous marriage. No one thought to consult my feelings in the matter! I was married in order to produce more Dangerfields. Thank God that after I had you I was allowed some respite!”

A tiny shiver of anger shook me as I looked at her flushed face.

“You hated my father. And you hated me from the moment I was born. I'm a product of your hate, Mother dear. Why blame me for being stronger than you were?”

“Why? Because you are hard. It's not strength, but hardness—a lack of feeling in you.”

“It's hardly important now.”

“No, I suppose not. But the blame wasn't all mine! I was prepared to be a good wife. If your father had loved me more and despised me less, something might have come of it. But he too married to please others. There was another woman. I never knew who she was or what she was to him, but he would mutter her name sometimes, in his sleep. ‘Elena—' he would say—‘Elena!' And he called you Rowena Elaine. No, he never loved me! Is it any wonder that I sought love?”

For an instant I saw her as she must have looked twenty years ago, before she became overly plump and the fine lines etched themselves in her face. Poor Fanny. Product of her environment. But as selfish in her own way as she accused me of being. Whatever her reasons for her sudden outburst, we were past the point of understanding each other, or, for that matter, of any genuine communication.

So I looked back at her, saying nothing, and after a while, shrugging, she seemed to regain her composure.

“Ah, well. Perhaps it's a good thing we need not indulge in the conventional strain of farewells. There were things that I felt had to be said, and they are behind us now.”

We did not kiss when the time for final parting came. A footman lifted my trunks from the carriage and set them down for the swarming porters to carry. Nor did I turn my head when the carriage drove off. Within a few hours I would be leaving the past behind me and embarking on a new life. I remembered my last journey, and could almost have smiled with pity for the miserable, frightened, and resentful creature I had been then. Could it have been only two years ago? This time, at least, I knew what I was going to.