“Clearly I’m needed,” Ambrose said directly to Dicky as they shook hands around her back.
“You made it in one piece.” Dicky’s wide, panicked smile belied his nerves.
Seeing them side-by-side, Ambrose felt their connection, could practically see it shimmering. And for once in his life Dicky was silent. He wouldn’t look Ambrose in the eye, and stepped back, trying to beat a quick silent retreat, when Aunt Clara put a hand on his arm, keeping him at her side. She had a nose for discord and a force of will that ordered the world to her ideas of propriety. She fancied herself a diplomat, but was viewed more like a policeman. She was also a world traveler, having flown into Persia via biplane. She would want tidbits of Ambrose’s trip, exotic tastes she might savor. And she’d do it while keeping an eye on “young Richard.”
“Mr. Rockhill wrote to me that you met with him in Tokyo.”
Ambrose felt the barb in the statement. He hadn’t written his aunt once during his trip. He’d assumed his letters to his father would be passed around the extended family. She seemed not to want to scold him tonight, though, and for that he was grateful. He felt an odd sort of sympathy emanating from his usually dour aunt. She shared all her brother Israel’s views on Prohibition and the youth of the day, but she differed with him on women participating in civic life. With the new right to vote, she’d even mentioned getting involved with politics herself, which her brother found unspeakable. That she had only obliquely chastised Ambrose’s lack of communication was an unusual mercy.
“You would have enjoyed Tokyo,” he told her. “Temples in every corner of the city, blossoms every which way.”
“I do so enjoy nature.” She was swathed in silk and velvet, acres of it, and nodded at him with a look in her eye usually reserved for the very young or very old.
Sweat dampened Ambrose’s collar. He realized he stank. His beard started to itch. He needed a bath. He wanted a drink. He needed something to do besides stand here under scrutiny, and then he thought of the crates he’d shipped home.
“Let me show you what I brought back for Ethan. I think you’ll especially enjoy it,” he said to his aunt.
“What’s that?” Ethan asked reflexively at the sound of his name.
“Let me give you your present,” Ambrose called loudly over to him, noting May was watching. Giving his brother a gift in public seemed like a good idea, as if Ambrose might adjust the balance of whatever scale weighed above all their heads.
His father called the chauffeur, and Ambrose helped the man bring the largest of the crates into the front hall from the icehouse, where they’d been kept in cool storage.
The whole party followed them out into the hall.
Ambrose called for a crowbar, and after much pulling and prying and huffing, the lid was detached and lifted. Inside, securely packed in straw, lay the severed, stuffed, and preserved head of a blackbuck antelope.
“A beauty!” Ethan said, leaning over and attempting to heft the trophy into the room with one hand, trailing a mountain of sawdust and wrappings onto the floor. Ambrose had to catch the heaviest part of the mount and help his brother carefully lower it to the floor. Admirers pressed forward, wanting to touch the taxidermied beast.
“A perfect specimen,” his aunt Clara exclaimed. “No doubt the natural history museum will be envious.”
“They must already have one,” Ambrose said.
“But not nearly so fine,” said Ethan. “Look at these horns!”
“It’s macabre,” May said quietly.
“You cannot deny the beauty of this animal,” Ethan said, flourishing his good hand in display.
“Dead animal,” she said.
“Yet no less majestic for it.” Ethan turned toward his brother. “It’s going to look splendid out at the farm. Probably in the front hall.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Ambrose said.
May smiled at him, a bit sickly, he thought. Ambrose couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for her. She looked so dejected that he decided to give her the necklace right then. Really, what could it possibly matter now?
“I knew this wouldn’t be your sort of thing, May,” Ambrose said, nodding toward the antelope. He lowered his voice, trying to be confidential, but somehow the room had silenced and everyone listened. He snaked his hand into his pocket. “I brought you something else.”
He brought the necklace out like a totem and offered it to her.
He could tell she didn’t want to take it from him, didn’t want to touch it, and he proffered it more emphatically against the back of her closed fingertips until she really had no choice but to open her hand.
“It’s a traditional wedding gift in India. The groom’s family gives the bride jewels. Instead of a dowry,” he said.
Somewhere in the background his father muttered, “Heathens.”
This seemed to jolt May back to her good manners, as reflexive as breathing. The litany of dull platitudes—“Thank you” and “Isn’t it beautiful?” and “I really like it”—all landed hollow on Ambrose’s ears. All except for the “You shouldn’t have”—that one sounded like truth.
“I’ll help you,” Loulou said, tying the ribbons around May’s neck.
“Ambrose, you have an eye,” his aunt Clara said with satisfaction. “I wouldn’t think it would flatter May, but look at her.”
Everyone in the room turned to admire May in the heavy collar with the bright azure stone surrounded by its rainbow of gems. Instead of dwarfing her, the immense size of it suited her, a queen with a proper-sized jewel. The gold set off red tints in her hair; the deep blue enhanced her pale skin.
“It’s heavy,” she said. “Like a yoke.”
Ethan crossed the room and lifted the piece like a doorknocker before letting it fall back on May’s chest with a soft thump. “Certainly portable,” he said, turning to his brother. “Makes it as easy as possible for the wife to get away. I wonder if that’s wise.” He turned to his brother. “Thank you.”
The words hit Ambrose like a slap. Ethan thanking Ambrose for a present for his wife was the most natural thing in the world. The claim Ethan had on May was both shockingly real and completely casual.
Mrs. Gilder came in then, calling them all to dinner. Loulou quickly detached herself from Dicky and made for Ambrose, as if to save him. But before she got to him and because they were standing next to each other, and because it would be unnatural not to, Ambrose offered his arm to lead May in.
“Where’s it from?” she asked, privately, hand touching her chest.
“India. I told you.”
She turned to look at him then, no need for the question between them.
“Jaipur,” he said more quietly as he pulled out her chair and helped her into her seat. She gripped his arm, giving him the lightest squeeze. That slight pressure reassured him. The past would soon be covered over by a number of new memories they’d make as family, as brother-and sister-in-law. Their past was a silly youthful interlude, quickly forgotten and never to be mentioned in what would be a long kinship. Without looking at her, he felt that. He sensed she knew it, too.
THE GUN RACKS