The Family Way (Molly Murphy, #12)

Sid and Gus kept Bridie informed as we proceeded northward. She looked fearfully at the great stone wall of the prison at Ossining and asked if the convicts ever escaped. Then the train came to a halt in Cortland. We were the only people to disembark, and we walked through a deserted station forecourt. This was a sleepy country town with only a few shops and cottages to be seen. We went into the nearest store, a pharmacy, and asked if they knew where the Robbins family lived. There was a young girl at the counter but an older man came forward to speak with us.

“You mean old Josiah Robbins?” he asked.

“We’re looking for a Miss Emily Robbins,” I said.

“That would be his granddaughter. She’s back from her travels now, so we hear.”

“And where would we find her?”

“They all live out on the family estate. About two miles from town. A fine house, it is. Honniton, that’s the name of it. But we call it the Ice Palace around here. Old Man Robbins had it built about thirty years ago. He made his money from ice, you know. Owned the ice lease for this stretch of river. Who’d have thought that a man could get rich from selling frozen water, eh?” He shook his head.

We asked about how we might find transportation out to their house and were told there was a livery stable in town where we might find someone willing to drive us. We went straight there and rented what looked like a rather rickety buggy. Gus assured me that she would be able to drive it splendidly and Sid looked confident in her abilities, so I hoisted Bridie up to join them and we set off. I need not have worried. The tired old nag was not capable of going beyond a walking pace and it took us a good hour to cover the ground to the Robbins estate. It was indeed a fine-looking house, a veritable Hudson mansion, built in the manner of a French chateau set amid manicured lawns, and I wondered at people like this sending their daughter off to the grim convent. They must have wanted to punish her very badly.

A servant came out at the sound of our approach and led the horse away while we went inside to a cool front hall with marble floor. A maid went off to summon her mistress and almost immediately we heard the tapping of heels on the marble floor and a thin woman in a severe gray dress came out to meet us.

“May I help you?” she asked, taking in the cut of our clothes and no doubt Sid’s cropped hair.

“I’m sorry to intrude but we were hoping to find Miss Emily Robbins here,” I said. “Is she at home?”

“She is,” the woman replied, “but I’m afraid she is occupied with another visitor at the moment. Her fiancé, Mr. Clifton, is here and they are going through wedding plans together.”

“Her fiancé, how lovely,” I said. “I hadn’t realized that she had become engaged.”

“Are you friends of hers?” the woman asked. “I don’t recall meeting you before.”

“You must be her mother. We are friends of a friend, who recommended that we give our best wishes to Emily as we were making a tour of this area,” I said, keeping as close to the truth as possible.

“So you’re not from these parts then?” Mrs. Robbins asked.

“We live in New York City,” I said. “I am currently staying with a family member in Elmsford.”

“And your connection with Emily?”

I was tempted to say that we met her abroad recently, knowing of the lie they had perpetrated about her. I wondered how she would handle that. But she saved me from having to come up with a lie by adding. “From school, I presume.”

“That’s right,” I said. “From school.”

At that moment there was the sound of feet on the marble floor and two people came down the long corridor toward us. One was a pretty, young dark-haired girl; the other a ruddy-faced, robust middle-aged man. When Emily’s mother had mentioned her engagement I had hoped that she might have been allowed to marry the father of her child. But I hadn’t expected this old and unattractive man. Surely he couldn’t be the one?

As he bent to give her a kiss on the cheek I watched her flinch and knew that he wasn’t. I guessed she was being rushed into marriage for respectability’s sake and to get her away from the house where her family found her presence repugnant.

“I’ll come for you in the morning then,” the ruddy man said. “And you can take a look at the furnishings for yourself. We can change the wallpaper if it’s not to your taste.”

Emily nodded, looking at us with interest.

“How kind you are, Mr. Clifton,” Emily’s mother said. “Emily, where are your manners. Thank your fiancé for his kindness.”

“Thank you, sir,” Emily muttered.

“And look here, Emily, my dear, you have visitors,” her mother said. “Apparently old school friends.”

I expected her to say she’d never seen us before in her life. I said quickly, “We weren’t exactly friends at school, but we shared a friendship in common with Maureen.”

“Maureen?” she asked, her eyes darting from one face to another.

“Your friend Maureen. From school. She asked us to pay a call on you, on her behalf.”

I saw a flicker in her eyes and she said. “Of course, I remember now. Maureen, from school.” She emphasized the last word. “And I do remember you now. You were all in the senior class when I first arrived and you were so kind to me. How nice of you to look me up again.”

“I’ll be off then, Emily, my dear. Good-bye. Until tomorrow,” her fiancé said.

“Good-bye, Mr. Clifton,” she said.