Everything in her struggled against saying, "Thank you."
But why shouldn"t she? He"d come in response to her letter.
Maybe he"d come as an answer to Armand"s prayer. To her longing for someone able to sweep her off her feet. Someone to give her a great love story to tell over the years, to cherish for decades like Armand and Caroline, like Lydia and John, and Lydia and Craven.
The grandson of the novelist who wrote about the English Country Garden.
Perfect!
She showed him the stateroom keys that had been found in Stanton-Jones"s and Lady Lavinia"s clothing.
"What"s-" he questioned, "that got to do with anything. Those names? Lady? The double name?"
He knew nothing of them. "That"s it?" Disappointment shrouded his face. "You have the wrong person."
"You"ll know when I show you something else."
He followed her home in his car.
When Caroline saw him, she grew emotional and wanted to hug him. She did. They sat at the kitchen table. Caroline handed him Once Upon. He looked blandly at the cover and turned it over.
He was startled. "My dad resembled him."
Caroline told him about Stanton-Jones on the t.i.tanic, and little Henry on the Carpathia, the birthday party, the package he"d held onto, the Meccano set.
"I have that set," he said with wonder. "Everything in the house burned. Dad kept the set in the trunk of his car. Said he"d had it since he was a child."
Caroline told him what his sister had written. "Mary and Bobby Freeman forbade her to mention the disaster, said Henry was too young to remember and if she told him it would warp her brother"s mind. He had nightmares," Caroline said. "He would call for Phoebe and-"
"Wait," Alan interrupted. "He"d call for what?"
"Phoebe. His sister."
"Phoebe," he said slowly. "Dad had nightmares and would scream out something like "feeb." I thought it had no meaning." Alan raised his hand to his hair and clenched it, as if this were all a wad of something difficult to untangle.
"He never mentioned a sister. But he often said he had nothing." Alan spoke the words self-consciously, as if he hadn"t meant to imply his dad considered him nothing.
Armand spoke wisely, "Childhood trauma, it sounds like. Maybe he didn"t remember the tragedy, but he experienced it. It was in there."
Joanna wondered if Alan was living with childhood trauma. She shared the information Beau had sent. "That had to be horrible, your watching that fire."
Alan shook his head. "Dad didn"t let me watch the burning. I just saw the ashes."
That held the sound of a double meaning.
"Dad was in the yard. I"d just gone inside when it happened. The boom. The flash. He rushed for me. By the time he got me to safety, the house was engulfed. He held my face to his chest and kept murmuring that he was there, to listen to his heart and I"d know everything would be all right."
Caroline wept. When she was able to speak, she told him about being in the boat. Told him how she held Henry, what she told him, and that Phoebe kept saying she was there.
Alan"s voice trembled, "If either of us had known, things might have been different."
Armand touched Alan"s arm. "We can"t do anything about the if "s. We deal with what is."
Alan nodded. "I learned about that in the war. Fight and survive."
They agreed, and because Lydia"s secrets were known now, Caroline began to tell about precious little Henry as a ring bearer. They all laughed and delighted in the memories. She told Alan about Lady Lavinia. Through the day, through dinner, into the evening.
Finally, they decided there were so many stories, so much to talk about, they"d invite others to tell him more. In the meantime, he could stay at the lake house.
Caroline had a good feeling about him, and Armand gave Joanna a knowing glance before taking Alan to the lake house.
Joanna hoped Alan would get busy with his broom, because her feet were ripe for the sweeping.
77.
Alan thought he"d found a gold mine in meeting the beautiful Joanna but realized she wasn"t someone to toy with, but a girl a guy might take seriously, something he hadn"t considered before. Not that he"d had much opportunity in the past few years, having been on the front lines with a weapon in his hands.
He was fascinated that she held in her hazel eyes the green secret Armand told him about, inherited from her grandmother. Joanna cooked a dinner for him in the lake house. They walked along the lake, watched the sunset, embraced in the twilight, kissed in the dark, and returned to the lake house, where she walked right past as if without a thought of going inside. She took him to church on Sunday. He hadn"t done that since his childhood, with two parents, a lifetime ago.
Joanna called Phoebe, and Alan talked to her. Phoebe cried. He had an aunt. His dad"s sister.
He had friends and family and a girlfriend who were beyond anything he could have imagined, and he was an imaginative fellow. He"d never known family life could be like this. He met Caroline"s family and Bess"s family and heard their stories.
He said he"d send for the Meccano set, but they didn"t want to chance it being lost in the mail. His landlord would be notified, a servant . . .
Servant?
. . . would be sent to get it, and Lydia Dowd would fly in with it.
Lydia Dowd. Beautiful older woman with hair like snow. Eyes like sapphires. Money written all over her, and around her neck and on her fingers, looking like a jewel herself. With some people you just knew. Anybody in New York knew the name.
Lydia, as she insisted he call her, told him a shortened version of her story. Even so, it sounded like a best-seller to him. Alan"s dad had been a ring bearer in her wedding on the t.i.tanic.
Who wouldn"t sit-stand up and listen to that?
He remained sitting, but it wasn"t easy. Stanton-Jones, his grandfather, had become John"s best friend on the t.i.tanic. These people had been first-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers on the t.i.tanic. They treated him, one who struggled to pay rent, like a firstcla.s.s person.
Their stories, his story, became bigger than life. But he could get it on paper, and it would be his life.
Each night before turning out the lamp, he stared at Once Upon on the bedside table. He hadn"t read it. Just reading the author"s name was enough.
Henry George Stanton-Jones, II.
What a name.
So Alan Freeman Morris"s dad was really Henry George Stanton-Jones, III.
Or, Henry George Freeman Morris Stanton-Jones, III.
Alan was, if he took his dad"s name, Alan Freeman Morris Henry George Stanton-Jones, IV.
That wouldn"t even fit on a book. He could use it and take up two lines or shorten it to Alan Stanton-Jones, IV.
He could write the t.i.tanic book in time for the fiftieth memorial. It would be celebrated all over, even in England and Ireland.
At last, the great American novel was laid in his lap, meant to be. His time had come.
They all acted like he was somebody. Well, his grandfather was a famous novelist. His great-grandmother and greatgrandfather were royalty.
As if that was not enough, they all became ecstatic about Lydia"s son arriving.
Beau Dowd!
No. Couldn"t be that one. The biggest movie producer in Hollywood?
But he was.
And he moved into the lake house with Alan. He wanted to get to know him.
This slowed down Alan"s interaction with Joanna.
After all, he had to make a living. No, make that a mint.
Beau talked to him like he was just another guy, so Alan reciprocated. He was a descendant of royalty, after all. He finally mentioned he might write a book about the t.i.tanic and discovered what he should have known all along. Beau had the rights to everyone"s stories. Legal right. Contracts.
Alan had nothing.
Until he learned that Beau Dowd needed Alan Morris"s legal permission, his being Stanton-Jones" heir, to make a movie of Once Upon.
Alan stared at the contract. The advance would enable him to give up the rinky-d.i.n.k apartment, be financially secure for longer than he could estimate. And he wouldn"t need additional work anyway since he"d be consulting on the filming of the movie.
Considering his newly-acquired background and the a.s.sociation with Beau Dowd, he could almost see the greenbacks covering his life like springtime across a meadow.
Several weeks later he strolled along the path by the lake while the sun dropped into the horizon and the sky turned dark and he found himself alone.
Lately, he hadn"t given much thought to eye color.
78.
Joanna had grown up with family and friends who shared their confidences, admitted their weaknesses, and prayed together. She didn"t feel the time had come for her to share just yet. She knew Alan needed the acceptance they offered. He had family now. He had friends.
Having spent a restless night and awakened early, she made coffee, filled her cup, and went out back. Fog lay across the landscape like the mist that lay over her mind.
"May I join you?" she heard as she stood staring into visibility obscured.
"Any time." She recognized the voice of Beau, with whom she"d had a special bond since she was twelve and approached him about Once Upon. They"d discussed it as if he valued her opinion.
Since then, she valued his opinions in particular. In silence she finished her coffee, set the cup on a table, and walked with him through the English gardens Caroline loved to tend. They looked like they belonged in an impressionistic painting.
"Why did it change, Joanna?" Beau asked.
"He changed."
"How?"
"When I first saw him, I knew my fantasy of a love story like the English Country Garden had arrived," she said. "He could, and did, sweep me off my feet. I fell in love with the good qualities in him." She sighed. "Maybe I thought something was there that wasn"t."
"What did you think you saw?"
"A vulnerability."
"Like inside him is an insecure little boy? Wanting his daddy"s love? Wanting to be something, somebody, and beginning to think money could buy it?"
"Exactly what I was thinking." She laughed lightly. "At least, something like that. He"s become a different person."
"You"re right. He is a different person. You expect humility?"
His question held the answer to that. They walked beside drystone walls lined with trees standing like gray sentinels.
"So. He changed from a fantasy to a real person. Tell me, if you had to choose, what would it be, Alan or the movie?"
She turned quickly. "You wouldn"t take the movie from him, would you?"
"I could. He"d keep the advance, but there"d be no movie, no fame, and he"d become his old, charming self. Is that what you want?"
She felt foolish. "I want it all."
"And what is "all"?"
She scoffed. "Why didn"t you become a psychiatrist instead of a movie guru?"
He shrugged. "I seem to be doing all right." He laughed lightly, then grew serious again. "Alan"s bright. Maybe he"ll have a quick recovery. When he learns he"s a boat adrift, he"ll come around. You and I have been blessed by people around us who have learned the difference between illusion and the real thing."
"You like him." Oh, she hoped he did.
"Yes. I see his potential. I see his need. His grandfather and my dad became friends on that boat, not because they were first-cla.s.s, but because they had two things in common. Their creativity and their faith."