Chapter Seventy-One
The DuMonts had been responsible for arranging the surprise visit and feted the two women in a birthday bash in their chateau-like mansion that recalled celebrations of the prewar decade. The attire of the guests was noticeably less fashionable and worse for wear, and the hoopless, softly bustled gowns of Camellia Warwick, Bess DuMont, and Tippy stood out like bright carousel ponies on a weathered merry-go-round.
“The war has taken its toll,” Tippy commented later of the guests and the reduced number from Houston Avenue in attendance at the party.
“As Silas predicted,” Jessica said.
“I noticed the Davises were missing. Did they not come because I was one of the honorees?”
“They did not come because they’re ashamed and extremely bitter over their diminished circumstances. I can understand and sympathize with their feelings to a point. They lost their son Jake in the war, such a sweet and good boy. Thomas and the boys miss him still. But Lorimer is responsible for his other losses. He fought Silas’s prediction that the Confederacy would lose to the North tooth and toenail and continued to buy land and slaves—on credit—when all reason said to wait for the war’s outcome. When he couldn’t meet his mortgage payments, all his property passed into control of a commission house in Galveston, including his home on Houston Avenue. The army general in charge of the district has leased it for himself and his officers, a further bitter pill for the Davises to swallow. They are not alone in their grief. Countless other prominent plantation families throughout East Texas have suffered the same fate.”
Tippy shook her head sadly. “But Somerset has survived.”
Jessica shrugged. “Silas saw to its survival for the sake of Thomas, and Thomas will see to it for the sake of his son. At three, Vernon already appears to be of the same weft and warp as his father. He begs to go with him when he leaves in the morning, but who knows but that the boy prefers his father’s company to a house full of women?”
“The boy is like him,” Tippy said in her familiar, prophetic voice.
Jessica felt the hairs rise on her forearms. She and Tippy were enjoying the fall sunshine on the front verandah where they had so often chatted, mindless of the neighbors’ outrage over one of their own being seen sipping tea with a Negro. Jessica sniffed at their disdain. Those who’d managed to hold on to their homes on Houston Avenue, with the exceptions of the DuMonts and Warwicks, should feel so financially privileged and socially connected as Tippy. Isabel, as she was now called, had become one of the most sought-after fashion designers in America. Her dress and accessory creations, designed for the garment manufacturing firm in New York where she’d first been employed, had been an instant hit and led to other, even more lucrative offers of positions in the world of haute couture. To be called haute couture (translated by Tippy to mean “high sewing”), a fashion house had to belong to the Syndical Chamber for Haute Couture in Paris, regulated by the French Department of Industry. Tippy designed for the only establishment in America that could claim membership in that august body. Her clients included the female members of the Astor and Vanderbilt and Morgan families, and she had become friends with Sarah Josepha Hale, editor of the notable Godey’s Lady’s Book and an important and influential arbiter of American taste.
“I don’t know that I wanted to hear that,” Jessica said, passing over the cream.
“That Vernon is like his father? Why not?”
Jessica stirred her tea. How to answer Tippy? Her quandary was the same as when she returned to her journal after a long absence and did not know where to begin, but, unlike the blank pages, Tippy would listen and respond. Her oldest and only woman confidante would be leaving in the morning, taking the train to New Orleans and on to New York accompanied by Jeremy, who had business in the city. Jessica had only a few remaining hours to take advantage of her counsel.
“Thomas followed in his father’s footsteps and married a woman he did not love on behalf of Somerset,” Jessica said.
Tippy’s eyebrows rose in concert. Like her hair, they were gray, thin, and wispy. “Thomas appears to be as fortunate in that respect as Silas was in marrying you,” she said.
“Oh, he’s grown to care for Priscilla enough.”
Jessica heard a thump from inside the house near the parlor windows where they sat. The servants were moving furniture to clean the rugs. “Have you finished your tea?” she asked.
Tippy peered into the contents of her cup. “Does it matter?”
“No. Let’s take a stroll about the garden. The Lancasters and Yorks are showing their best right now.”
Away from the house and the ears of the servants, Jessica told of the arrival of handsome and charismatic Major Duncan at a time when her son and daughter-in-law’s marriage was at a low ebb. “It was obvious to everyone but Thomas that he was taken with her,” she said, “and I’m afraid my daughter-in-law, attention-starved that she was, succumbed to his…interest.”
“Did Thomas find out?”
“No, thank God. It was right after the war. He had lost his father and was taken up with many concerns.”
Tippy drew Jessica to a stop. “So what is the problem, Jessica? Their marriage seems none the worse, and from what you’ve said of Priscilla’s frigidity, Major Duncan may have done Thomas a favor.”
“Oh, I’m not condemning the girl for her affair, if she had one, and it’s not my son I’m thinking of.”
“Who then?”
“Regina Elizabeth.”
Comprehension flashed in the dark depths of Tippy’s immense eyes like a trout breaking water. “You mean—”
“I do.”
“How can you be sure?”
“I’m not sure.” They were at the garden gate. Jessica unlocked it and they entered. “Major Duncan and Priscilla may have simply had an intense flirtation. He may have only made her feel good about herself, freed her fears about sex. I doubt that was all there was to it, but it’s possible. Priscilla is an impressionable girl. But what if, by some quixotic quirk of fate, Thomas finds out about them? God have mercy! It would be worse than the house crashing around our ears. Thomas would never feel the same about the child. Tippy”—Jessica turned to her imploringly—“you know about these things. You’re from the stars. Will we ever know for sure Regina is a Toliver?”
Tippy frowned as she reflected on the question. “I believe that in time all hidden things are revealed, Jessie, so yes, someday you’ll know, but I hope it won’t be too late for you to love her.”
Startled, Jessica said, “What makes you say that? Of course I love the child.”
“Not like you would if you knew for sure she carried your son’s blood.”
Jessica turned away, shamefaced. “You always could see what others could not. Oh, God, Tippy. I’m so disgusted with myself, but I…When I look at her, I see the freckles and red hair of Major Duncan. I grew to dislike him. He took advantage of the situation and Priscilla let him. Even though I understand how and why it happened and no one seems the worse for it, I can’t help but see the child as the fruit of their deceit.”
“You’re a mother, Jessie. You believe Priscilla, understandably or not, was unfaithful to your son, and that would naturally color your feelings for her and the child, but look at how you love Amy, Petunia’s daughter. She’s not of your blood or even your race.”
“That is true, Tippy, but loving the child of a friend is not the same as loving a child of family. Regina is adorable, and I would never hold her mother’s indiscretion against her, but I simply cannot feel for her the bond of blood I feel with Vernon.”
“You truly believe Regina is not Thomas’s, don’t you?”
“I can’t shake the certainty of it, and you know I’ve never been one to give the benefit of the doubt where I believe there is none.”
Tippy shook her head sadly. “A pity, my dear, for Regina will love you the most and seek your approval above all others.”
Jessica looked over the red and white roses in her garden, their bobbing heads brilliant in the autumn sun. Would there ever come a time she would be forced to lay a red rose at her granddaughter’s feet? Regina, at six months, was already showing signs of Tippy’s prediction. Like the housecat that sought Jessica’s company when she felt no particular affinity for felines, it was to her grandmother that Regina held out her arms from the crib and parlor floor, in Jessica’s lap she stopped crying when no one else could console her.
“Thomas loves his son,” Jessica said, “but he worships his daughter, and so does Vernon. I don’t want to think about their pain or Regina’s if what I believe to be the truth is ever discovered.” She closed her eyes. “But for Somerset, Thomas would never have married Priscilla. I’ve always worried that there will be a reckoning for that decision somewhere along the way. I so hope it will not be Regina who’ll bear the brunt of it.”
“No reckoning befell Silas for marrying you, Jessica.”
Jessica’s mirthless laugh cut the crisp air like a knife. “Oh, but it did, Tippy. Oh, but it did.”