FIRST PLACE
The Return of Edwin Hastings
By Kathy Altman
King George, Virginia
There was a mysterious tapping at the
window, and a sudden silence fell over the four people
sitting by the fireplace. It was as if a cold chill
had invaded the warmly lit room to remind them of the
threatening storm outside.
The two brothers and their wives had
been talking of Edwin Hastings, although they did not
speak of him often, for they had little enough to say.
He had simply walked away two years ago, leaving a
brief note:
“I will be back when I am ready.
I hope I have forgiven you by then.”
It was the storm that had
prompted the discussion, for it was on such a night
that Edwin had disappeared. Surprisingly, it was Cora
who had first put voice to
her thoughts.
“I do not believe he will return.” She
had spoken timidly, not looking at the others. They
had known, of course, to whom she referred.
May had stared out
the window at the restless dark. “ It is not always
a simple thing, to forgive.”
“Edwin will be back and he will
forgive us. He’s a Hastings. He knows his duty.
Now I suggest we speak of something else.” Cora’s
husband Jefferson turned toward his brother resolutely. “Had
you heard, Robert? Everett Flanders was set upon by
highway
robbers
on
his way home from Silvercreek this Tuesday last!”
The discussion of Edwin had ended with
Robert’s exclamation of grateful denial.
The scene in the parlor
was a Currier and Ives print brought to life. Cora
and May, similar in stature and in coloring, sat side-by-side
on the brocade sofa facing
the window, the satin of their stylish Princess gowns
draped becomingly around them in poufs of emerald
and
ivory. Two blonde heads bent in earnest concentration
over two pairs of dainty hands deft in
their needlework.
Facing the sofa on the other side
of the fireplace, their husbands reposed in matching
velvet wing chairs. The two brothers were as physically
dissimilar as the
wives
were alike. Jefferson, the elder brother, was
a tall,
lanky man, with ebony hair parted in the center
over a high forehead. He was tucked into his chair
like
a jack-in-the-box, ready to spring up at the slightest
touch. To his right nearer the fire sat Robert, a shorter
man with a ruddy complexion and muddy brown
mutton-chop whiskers. Both Robert and Jefferson
wore black suits, but Robert looked much less elegant
in his.
The parlor was a luxurious, tasteful
room, as befitted the residence of a family of high
social standing.
The walls were covered in a rich gold
and burgundy striped satin wallpaper, a splendid backdrop
for the Queen Anne furnishings. The fireplace was framed
by
a magnificent
mantel of dark fruitwood. The mantel
was decorated with intricate carvings and medallions,
and
over it
hung an excellent rendering of the Hastings
estate.
And yet the cheerful crackling of the fire
within that
noble hearth did little to dispel the tension
in the room, a tension that had become so customary
and so nearly palpable that it was a fifth member of
the household.
Something, or someone, tapped
again at the window. Cora’s hands stilled in
her lap and the handkerchief she’d
been detailing grew suddenly damp between her palms. “Jefferson …” she
quavered.
He glanced over at her impatiently. “Don’t
be silly, woman, it’s only a branch moving about
in the wind. Can you not hear the storm blowing up?”
“Of course we’re aware of
the storm, Jefferson.” May’s voice was
as calm as Cora’s was edgy. “It’s
been brewing for nearly two years now.”
“Oh, don’t start that rubbish
again!” bellowed Robert, startling the other
three. “You’ll
have Cora weeping over us all and Jefferson pulling
out that cursed foul-smelling pipe of his and ... well,
I just
won’t
have it!” Robert abruptly pushed
himself out of his chair and strode over to the corner
cabinet. Crystal clinked as he fumbled for the whiskey
decanter and
tipped it carelessly into a tumbler. “It’s
getting so a man can’t find peace in his own
home anymore!”
He turned from the cabinet and stilled,
the tumbler halfway to his mouth. Blood surged into
his plump cheeks as he faced three pairs of eyes focused
on the brimming
glass in his unsteady fingers. His lips worked.
He
started to speak and waved his free hand in surrender. “All
right, I admit it, damn you! “ He
raised the glass to his lips and drank deeply. It took
him
a moment to catch his breath. “This
damnable waiting. It’s getting to us all.” He
glanced at his wife, a picture of domestic serenity
as she
sat knitting on the sofa. “Even you, May.” She
raised her head slowly and he lifted his glass to her
in a derisive toast. “I drown my sorrows, Cora
sobs away her appetite, Jefferson cuddles his pipe
and wears
away at the carpet with his pacing, and you,” he
motioned with his glass at the silk evening cap on
her head. “You
lose your lovely hair by the handsful.”
May’s
hands fisted around the knitting needles and her face
paled. Cora gasped. “Oh, May,” she
murmured, covering her sister-in-law’s hand with
her own. May flinched from the coldness of Cora’s
thin fingers. “I hadn’t realized.” Cora
unconsciously raised her other hand to the nape of
her neck to touch her plump chignon.
Robert gulped again at the whiskey.
Jefferson cleared his throat and reached in his suit
coat pocket for his pipe. May and Cora sat unmoving.
The clock
ticked
rhythmically on the mantelpiece. Outdoors the
wind
surged against the house. A log shifted suddenly
in
the fireplace and four heartbeats stumbled.
May
toyed with the length of yarn in her lap. “We
deserve no less than this,” she observed eventually.
Her tone was matter-of-fact. “Guilt and worry
and the fear of retribution have been our constant
companions since Edwin left, and so will they be until
he returns
and
forgives us.”
Cora’s voice was low
but defiant. “We should have let Edwin make his
own decisions.”
“Balderdash!” Jefferson,
lighting his pipe despite his brother’s nasty
glances, leaned forward. “We’ve
been through this too many times. She would have brought
ruin to the family. We did what we had to do.”
“He loved her.” May stated
simply. Robert snorted and Jefferson rolled his eyes.
“Do you not think that Edwin has
a right to resent us for what we did?” ventured
Cora.
“Nonsense! What did we do? We found
her a good husband. Someone from her own ... quarter.
And I must say, it was a rather handsome wedding gift
we arranged.
They’ll want for nothing.”
Robert
bobbed his head once firmly as he resumed his seat
by the fire. “We did what was best for all
of them. Wasn’t our fault Edwin refused to see
reason.We didn’t ask the boy to leave.”
“No, we did not ask. We compelled.
Our own brother!” May sprang up from the sofa.
Her knitting slid unnoticed from her lap. “We
conspired against him! We ruined his chance for happiness!” She
began to sob, her hands folded tightly against her
heart. The ribbons on her cap trembled about her face. “We
deserve to be punished!”
Cora let out a wail
and began to rock back and forth, her thin arms wrapped
tightly about her waist. Slowly Robert lumbered to
his feet and pushed past his wife
to make
his unsteady way back to the corner cabinet.
Jefferson
sat forward in his chair and stared down
at his shoes.
The pipe dropped from his hand and leaves
of tobacco scattered over the carpet. Cora pressed
to
her wet face the handkerchief she’d been stitching.
The embroidery needle, dangling from a strand of peacock
blue thread, swung to and fro like a pendulum.
Outside
the sitting room window, Edwin shivered in his chesterfield,
though not from the gusts of night air that bullied
him. He braced himself against the
wind
and watched for long moments the agitated remains
of
what was once his family. Feelings he thought he
had
long since banished rose to buffet him with
a strength that rivaled that of the wind. With a twist
of his
lips that was more a grimace than a smile, Edwin
turned from the window and mounted for the last time
the brick steps of the Hastings mansion.
He bent to retrieve his bags where he had placed them
on the porch directly in front of the massive oak doors.
He turned, and stepped back out into the storm.
Copyright (c) 2003 for the
author, all rights reserved. |
