Fortune's rocks_ a novel - Anita Shreve [157]
“My dear,” her father says.
They clasp each other’s hands, the kiss having unleashed a torrent of feeling in Olympia. They sit in the leather chairs at a library table. Tucker stands discreetly at the door.
“Must you go through with this, Olympia?” her father asks.
“I will have my son restored to me, Father,” she says. “But I am distressed at the thought of the anguish this is causing you.”
“I do not have anguish if you do not,” he says. “And I no longer care about scandal. You should know that your mother did not agree to my . . . disposing . . . of the boy in the manner I did. She was most upset with me. And now . . . Well, I can hardly speak of now.”
“You have told her?”
“Yes, of course. I felt I must. She is bound to hear of it. Olympia, please let me help you. I wish to make amends. I shall stay here as long as I am needed. I will tell you, however, that I am bound to testify, for I have been summoned.”
“Do so, Father,” she says. “Tell the truth. It can only help me.”
“You must need money.”
Olympia sits up straighter and glances over at Tucker. “Mr. Tucker has been kind enough to defer all fees until such time as I can pay him.”
“Well, that is a matter Mr. Tucker and I shall settle between us,” her father says. “You must not try to be so independent, Olympia. It is not good for the heart.”
And she thinks, as she gazes all about her father’s face and his coat, rumpled and wet from his journey, that of course her father has wisdom about some matters.
“Father — ,” she says, but she cannot finish her sentence, for the door opens. Judge Levi Littlefield enters the room.
“Oh, excuse me,” he says. “I did not realize anyone was in here.”
Littlefield, who appears considerably smaller without his robes, seems for the first time to see the other person in the room.
“Phillip,” he says, advancing.
Olympia’s father stands. “Levi,” he says, putting out his hand.
“I am sorry you have had to appear in this matter. You came last night?”
“This morning.”
“And missed the brunt of the storm, I hope?”
“Just.”
“Well, I shall leave you to your conference.”
With a small nod in Olympia’s direction, and hesitating only slightly, Littlefield backs through the door.
“You and Judge Littlefield know each other,” Tucker says to Phillip Biddeford.
“A matter of pigs straying into the orchards and creating a general nuisance, as I recall,” Olympia’s father says. “Levi settled the matter with considerable grace and wit.”
Olympia remembers the invasion of the pigs from the Trainer farm. Six years ago? Seven?
Tucker smiles. “I imagine it was one of the more amusing matters to come before the court.”
“I daresay it was.”
“Father,” Olympia says, “let us take Mr. Tucker to lunch, and ascertain as well that you have a room at the hotel. There can be no thought of your journeying back to Boston until this weather has turned fine again.”
“Olympia,” her father says, turning to her, his face having regained some of its color. “I have missed you so very much.”
• • •
Counsel for the relator calls Phillip Arthur Biddeford to the stand:
“Mr. Biddeford, did you on the afternoon of fourteen April 1900 conspire to unlawfully remove the infant male child Pierre Francis Haskell from his mother, your daughter, Olympia Biddeford?”
“Yes, Mr. Tucker, I did.”
“Did you take the child yourself?”
“No, I did not. I had my wife’s personal maid take the child and bring him downstairs to me, whereupon I immediately bade my personal manservant, Josiah Hay, to transfer the child to its father, Dr. John Haskell.”
“And you had made prior arrangements with Dr. Haskell?”
“Yes, I had.”
“How so?
“By post.”
“At your instigation or at his?”
“At mine. I had written to the man through his lawyer.”
“And your agreement was?”
“That he would undertake to place the child with