In the Shadow of Lakecrest(21)
For a fleeting, chilling instant, I felt like a mythical princess, locked in a tower. Buried alive.
Then Matthew was reminding me that it was time to change for supper; his mother was expecting us downstairs. He showed me a dressing room where my clothes had already been hung, my shoes arranged in a neat row below, and I shook off my gloomy mood. Time to be the perfect daughter-in-law and perfect wife, biding my time until Matthew was firmly on my side. Then I’d convince him we should move out.
I was still na?ve enough to think I could do it.
What Hannah called her nightly “social hour” was cocktail hour for Marjorie, who’d stashed a silver flask behind a potted plant and discreetly offered me a splash for my iced tea. I declined. We said nothing about my sudden exit from the Pharaoh’s Club the night before, and I wondered how much she even remembered, given Blanche’s suspicions. Maybe her boisterous laughter had nothing to do with me at all. Hannah welcomed me with a seemingly genuine smile, showing no trace of her earlier haughtiness. If anything, she paid too much attention to me, insisting I join her at one of the card tables and examine an elaborate family tree she’d laid out on top. Apparently, my first duty as Matthew’s wife was to suffer through a lecture on the grand and glorious history of the Lemont family.
The trunk of the tree was Henri de Le Mont, a Frenchman who’d immigrated to Canada and followed the rivers westward as a fur trader. The next branch up was his son George, who had Anglicized the family’s name and founded the shipping line that made them rich. George’s son Obadiah, Lakecrest’s builder, was memorialized in a portrait that hung over the fireplace. With his broad shoulders, muttonchop whiskers, and semi-scowl, he was the epitome of a gruff Victorian patriarch.
“Don’t forget the Indian princess,” Marjorie said offhandedly. She looked at me and whispered melodramatically, “The black sheep.”
“Marjorie,” Hannah snapped. Then, for my benefit, “There’s no proof the story’s true.”
“They say old Henri fell in love with the daughter of an Indian chief,” Marjorie went on. “Married her and took part in some sort of blood-brother ceremony to show his loyalty. Of course, Mum’s horrified that the Lemont family tree may be tainted with Indian blood. But you don’t care, do you, Kate?”
“It’s nonsense,” Hannah said to me. “A legend. We have no idea who Henri’s wife was.”
“Because only the men’s stories survive,” Marjorie said. “Isn’t that what Aunt Cecily used to say?”
There was a moment of stillness, sharp and clear. Hannah stared at her daughter, aghast, and I privately savored the image of her looking so flustered. Recovering herself, she deftly changed the subject to Obadiah’s collection of Greek vases, and Matthew chimed in, anxious to smooth away the awkwardness. Cecily, it seemed, was off limits.
When Edna, the cook, announced supper was ready, Hannah led us into the cavernous dining room, a space built for banquets that felt intimidatingly vast with only four of us at the table. Gone were the days when Lakecrest had a live-in staff of twelve. Only Edna lived at the house now, in quarters off the kitchen; the two maids, Alice and Gerta, would go to their homes in the nearby town of East Ridge after the evening meal was served. The servants’ quarters had been closed for years, a forgotten remnant of more opulent times.
I looked at Matthew and Hannah and Marjorie taking their first bites of vegetable terrine and was overcome by what felt like a vision from the future. I saw all of us at this same table decades from now, making the same polite conversation, eating off the same gold-rimmed china. This was where we’d celebrate holidays and milestones, and in time I’d no longer feel like a nervous, self-conscious interloper.
These people were now my family.
“Cheers to Kate for making it through her first day at Lakecrest,” Matthew said heartily, raising his water glass for a toast.
Hannah nodded and waved her glass in my direction. “I hope you’ll be very happy here.” Her rigid expression softened, and I wondered if she had genuinely made peace with my marriage or was simply putting on a show for Matthew.
I heard a snort from Marjorie, but when I turned to look at her, she was staring down at her plate, the picture of innocence.
“Thank you,” I said. “I’ll admit that I feel a little overwhelmed. It’s going to take a while to learn my way around.”
“Goodness, yes,” Hannah said, giving me a surprisingly warm smile. “I still remember my first days here. Jasper—Matthew and Marjorie’s father—expected me to swoop in and take charge when I could barely find my way to the kitchen! I was quite beside myself.”
For the first time, I was able to think of Hannah as a real person, someone with weaknesses and fears.
“Well, I’ll be depending on you to show me everything,” I said. “I’m sure your mother-in-law was a great help to you, too?”
“Oh no, Jasper’s mother had been dead for years when we married. There was a housekeeper, Mrs. Briscoe, but she was elderly and quite hopeless. Lakecrest was a disaster when I moved in.”
“Mum was raised very differently,” Matthew explained. “German family, very Lutheran and orderly. Her father was a doctor—”
“A professor of medicine,” Hannah interrupted.
“Yes, Herr Doctor Professor,” Matthew acknowledged, with exaggerated solemnity. “If he wanted something done, you did it. With no complaints. We used to joke about it—remember, Marjorie?”