“Because it’s right. Because I loved your mother. Because I love you for your own sake, Lilliana. I would have taken you both in years ago, if only Rosemary had been able to leave your father. You know he telephoned the day she died.”
“Father?” And then I remembered the conversation in the church sanctuary—Father saying something about calling Mama’s aunt and his debts.
“He said he knew I would want to know and that he would be needing to sell the house—my house—to pay for Rosemary’s final expenses.”
“What? That’s not true. He has enough for that, or at least I think he does, and people in the church are helping him.” I felt my face warm. I’d taken that eighty dollars donated by one of the wealthier members and used it to buy my train tickets. And yet I knew that hadn’t been the only donation.
“I told him as much—that he should be able to pay his own wife’s expenses. He said I should know that Rosemary had willed everything to him, and of course that included Garden’s Gate. He thought I should know before he sent a lawyer and agent to sell.” Aunt Hyacinth shook her head. “He so generously offered me a month to move.”
“You willed Mama your home?”
“I never married. You may not know that. I raised your mama when her mother—my sister, Camellia—died.”
“Mama told me. She always thought of you as her mother.”
“Rosemary was a daughter to me, all I ever loved as my own in this world, and she came to me as a very little girl. She barely remembered her own mama.”
“I remember the summer Mama brought me here.”
“Do you? I didn’t know if you could; it was so long ago and you were such a tyke.”
“Those were the best days of my life, of my childhood. Until he came.”
“He came and terrified your mama into going.”
“He wanted to leave me here.”
“It was all I could do not to keep you. I feared what your life would be with him, but I knew your mama needed you as much as you needed her. I knew that you were all that made her life worth living once she was under that man’s spell.”
“Why didn’t she stay or come back here—to you, to Garden’s Gate?” I asked questions I’d pondered over and over for Mama—and for me.
“She was afraid. She was so very afraid of him. He vowed he’d hunt her down and get her back, no matter where she went, and that he’d go to court to claim desertion and prove her an unfit mother.”
“Could he have done that?”
“It’s a man’s world, Lilliana, don’t you know?”
I did know, had every reason to know. “Then he will come. If Garden’s Gate is his, he’ll sell it. He won’t care that he turns you out, Aunt Hyacinth—or me.”
“Come here? Oh, I don’t think he’ll be coming here.”
“But you said he—”
“He was right that I’d willed my home to Rosemary. She was to inherit it after I pass, not before. Somehow he’d gotten it in his head that I’d put the property in her name already. There is a grave plot in the churchyard in her name; that’s all. A place where I’m to be buried. I put it in Rosemary’s name believing she could handle the details when the time comes, that she’d outlive me. That’s what he inherits—little good it will do him. Though I’m sorry about that now. Unless he allows me to purchase it from him, it will mean I won’t be buried next to my family.” Aunt Hyacinth sighed. “I’m no fool. I won’t sign over my home—my family’s home for five generations—until I draw my last breath.”
“And then he’ll take it. Take it and sell it.”
“No, he won’t. I talked with my lawyer the moment I hung up the phone. I’ve made a new will. Garden’s Gate will be yours when my time comes.”
“But you hardly know me!”
“I hope we’ll change that. And even if we don’t, there’s no one else I’d want to have it. You are bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh, Lilliana Grace. Your grandmother and I grew up in this house. Our father was a child in this house, along with his older brother and sister. The Belvideres have owned this land since No Creek was founded before the Revolution. I’d like it to stay in the family, of course. Our family has lived here long years. I hope you will—if you want.”
I didn’t know what to say. It was an extravagant gift, but too much, too soon, and how could I commit to such a life? How could I know what my future might bring—other than threats from Gerald and Father?
“If you choose to sell Garden’s Gate after I’m gone, I trust you to sell it for a fair price and a good reason, an amazing future—nothing less. Certainly not for a man who treats you poorly. I love my past, but I love your future more.” Aunt Hyacinth spoke in my direction.
I wanted—desperately needed—help and sanctuary, at least temporarily. But would I be able to stay? What if Gerald comes for me? And if Garden’s Gate becomes mine, couldn’t he take it? Sell it? Whether or not he could, did I want to commit to a life in No Creek, North Carolina? Did I want to commit to anyone ever again?
“What do we need to do to make certain they don’t find you? Have you asked yourself that?”
It took me a moment to register Aunt Hyacinth’s question. But I’d thought of little else during the long hours of my train ride. “I took off my ring. I threw it in the first trash bin I came to.” I realized too late that perhaps I should have sold it, plain gold band that it was, but I’d just wanted to get rid of it—a shackle on my finger. “I thought of changing my name. But I can’t do that legally, not without leaving a trace.”
“No, I suppose not. But it’s a good idea, before either of them think to come here or to telephone here again. It’s one thing for me to say you’re not here, but our telephone operator is chatty and all too willing to share gossip she shouldn’t.”
“He—Gerald—wants to divorce me.”
“That’s good, isn’t it? You’d be free of him.” Aunt Hyacinth’s face gained color.
“He wants to do it by having me committed to an institution—declaring me unstable and insane, then fabricating a story that the instability made me promiscuous. That gets his divorce within the state of Pennsylvania and his freedom and sympathy within the church.”
“That’s ludicrous!”
“He’s convinced Father to back him up—to make it seem that my grief for Mama is excessive and unnatural and sent me over the edge. I think he’s willing to pay people to stand as ‘witnesses’ for—for whatever he says.”
Aunt Hyacinth didn’t say anything for a time. I wondered if she believed me. Why should she? It was all so outlandish. “I overheard them. They didn’t know I was listening. Gerald threatened to expose Father’s treatment of Mama and, I think, some of his past behavior toward other women.”
“Stirring the pot.”
Try as I might, I couldn’t keep my voice steady. “I don’t want to be locked up for the rest of my life, and I can’t keep on there. That’s why I left as I did—not a scrap of luggage, nothing but my purse—and your ring. Thank heaven I’d sewn it into the lining or it would still be in Philadelphia. Oh, I must give it to you—I promised Mama.”