Page 41 of The Lost Hours
Odella straightened. “So who was the third friend?”
“Annabelle O’Hare. Josie’s mother worked for her father, Dr. O’Hare.” Lillian squeezed the metal frame, as if the action would somehow bring them all back to that moment when life stretched before them, a road of shimmering possibilities. “We were thick as thieves.” Lillian grinned at the memory.
“Who’s the man?” Odella pointed to the tall man with the straw hat and striped jacket.
“That’s Freddie Montet, Josie’s brother.”
Odella whistled. “He’s what the kids today would call ‘hot.’ But are he and Josie really related? He could sure pass for white.”
“And he did. He even attended university in England, and did very well. That summer, he told me that he’d run out of funds and that he was going to work with the horses at Asphodel like he’d been doing during his school breaks to earn enough money to return.”
Odella tucked her chin into her neck. “But who paid for the rest of it? I can’t imagine he would have earned much working for your daddy during the Depression.”
Lillian blinked at her image in the mirror. “I’ve asked myself that a dozen times. To be honest, when I was young it never occurred to me to question it. It was only in my adult life that I began to wonder. His mother was the housekeeper in a doctor’s household and his father was never in the picture. I suppose he could have borrowed funds from the doctor—but I always thought that would have been a lot more forward-thinking for the times back then than it would be now.”
Lillian leaned forward and placed the frame on her dressing table. “Not that it matters anymore. Freddie’s been dead for a long time. Before I married my Charlie and that was almost seventy years ago.”
“That’s a shame,” Odella said as she held on to Lillian’s elbow until the older woman had grabbed her cane. “A real shame.”
By the time they’d reached the dining room, Lillian was exhausted. The memories pressed down on her, as heavy as the layer of years, making her stumble. She turned to Odella to ask her to take her back to her room, but her eyes settled on Earlene instead.
Earlene stood behind her chair in conversation with Helen, across the table. She was angled slightly, so that her back was partially turned to Tucker in a not-so-subtle gesture. Tonight she had her hair pulled back, showing her profile, and her long elegant neck. And, despite the shoulders that Earlene seemed to force into a rounded position, she held her head regally, as if she’d once been used to being looked upon with admiration and hadn’t quite learned how to hide it completely.
But there was something else that drew Lillian into the room toward her seat at the head of the table. It was the feeling of familiarity she felt with Earlene, of having found a friend. It was odd, considering their age difference, but maybe a love for flowers and horses was the great equalizer—the ties that bound the generations together like smocking on a dress.
Lillian’s ruminations were interrupted by Tucker as he came to her side to escort her to the table while Odella returned to the kitchen. He kissed her on the cheek and cupped her elbow in his hand. “I’m sorry we missed you for cocktails, but I made your favorite and it’s waiting by your plate.”
He pulled out her chair and seated her before returning to his chair and waiting for everyone else to sit before joining them. Conversation was light while they passed the dishes that Odella had brought in, and Lillian carefully watched the skittishness between Tucker and Earlene, like two magnets of the same pole.
Lillian turned to Tucker. “Where are Lucy and Sara?”
Tucker wiped his mouth with a cloth napkin. “They were exhausted from horseback riding and from swimming in the pond for most of the afternoon. Emily’s making them grilled-cheese sandwiches and tomato soup and putting them to bed early. She didn’t have classes tonight and offered to stay.”
“Are they here or at your house?” Lillian took a long sip of her cocktail but even that wasn’t taking the edge off her impatience with her grandson. To outsiders it would appear that his cup of grief was bottomless, and maybe that was true. But she’d seen Tucker’s face when they’d pulled Susan from the river, and the look of relief that had initially crossed it. The grief had come later, but Lillian had never been completely convinced it had been grief over Susan’s death.
Tucker set down his glass of wine. “They’re here. Emily is off at nine and I . . . have plans for later tonight. I didn’t think they should be left alone at the tabby house.”
“No,” said Lillian tightly, “I don’t imagine they should be.”
They ate in silence for a while, the clink of silver against fine china the only sounds. Lillian kept stealing glances at Helen, who seemed unusually restless. Her fingers played with the unused utensils, flipping them over and dropping them on the tablecloth.
Finally, Helen’s fingers stilled and she leaned across the table toward Earlene. “How is your research coming along?”
Earlene took her time chewing her food and washing it down with wine, as if buying time to figure out an answer. “Very well, actually. Thank you. I’ve finished going through Miss Lillian’s papers and those have been very helpful in gathering the names of people who would have been in the area in the earlier part of the last century.” She turned to Lillian. “The plantation business records have been particularly interesting, and make a good illustration of the business decline during the Great Depression. I noticed that by nineteen thirty-seven your father had sold about thirty of his horses and was down to one stable hand. That must have been hard for you.”
Lillian took a large sip of wine, sensing Helen’s interest. She raised her eyebrow, hoping to convey uninterest and a real desire to steer the conversation away from where she was afraid it might lead. “One’s lack of funds is generally considered to be a difficult thing. Losing one’s favorite horse to the highest bidder would be another one.”
Helen tilted her head, her brow wrinkled. “The remaining stable hand would have been Freddie, right, Malily?”
Lillian dabbed at the corners of her mouth with her napkin, nostalgia tugging her backwards. Her gaze found Earlene. “Yes. Probably because Papa didn’t have to pay him the same wages he’d been paying the Irishmen. Were there any accounting records of my come-out ball? I was discussing that with Helen just this morning.”
“Yes, actually, there were. For the wine, and the flowers, and your dress. It must have been a beautiful evening. The guest list was there, too, but I didn’t see your gardening friend—Annabelle.”
Lillian slowly chewed a forkful of food, but didn’t taste anything. “I suppose I’ll have to admit to a little spite. I believed at the time that she and I had romantic aspirations about the same man, and I didn’t welcome the competition.” She took another sip of her wine. “Besides, Annabelle was busy crusading against public ills and wouldn’t have come anyway.”
“But she helped with the flowers,” Helen added.
“Yes, she did do that,” Lillian answered, once again smelling the calla lilies and the gladiolus, and feeling the warmth of Charlie’s hand on the small of her back. Exhausted again, Lillian leaned back in her chair and regarded the other table occupants through half-closed eyes, her attention grabbed by Earlene, whose hand had slipped into the collar of her blouse, her fingers moving around the circumference of her neck as if she were searching for something.
