O'hara's Choice - Leon Uris [100]
Horace Kerr knew that when one is on the right course, one picks up allies. The strongest notion that had ever gripped his daughter was to found a women’s college. It would be her giant step into becoming one of the great women of the century.
The second ally was Dixie Jane. Horace and Daisy loved the child no less than if they had been her own grandparents. There were genuine virtues in the child, her fine manners and response to affection and, mostly, how kind and gentle she was with Emily.
The third ally was Baroness Lilly Villiard, who had appeared in Newport socially with O’Hara. Seemed proper enough—old girl, young military escort.
George Barjac and Horace were fellow Marylanders, both Republicans who’d freed their slaves early. They were occasionally at odds about who was dumping the most waste into the Chesapeake, Dutchman’s Hook or Barjac’s tobacco plantation.
Horace prayed regularly that Lilly Villiard was atop O’Hara . . . or under him . . . five nights a week. There could be no doubt that if and when Amanda got a wisp of Lilly, she’d wish O’Hara dead.
The trees began to doff their summer’s wear as the sun rose lower and cast longer shadows. Dixie Jane saw them from her window as icy fingers crawling toward her. Nini Constable would be fetching her daughter soon.
Amanda instructed Dixie Jane to muster maturity and to open her heart to create a special attitude for the situation.
“We have to make do with the mother and father given us. Nini needs her girl and Dixie Jane will need her mother. Your mom and Mr. Dorfman want to make you happy and you have to do your part.”
Dixie Jane had been thoroughly lectured on the sadness of divorce and of her duty not to make things more difficult. Nothing, she was told, can take the place of blood.
Dixie Jane wanted to know only one thing from Amanda.
“Are you and my daddy going to get married?”
“We certainly seem to be heading that way,” Amanda said in a non-Amanda answer.
“Can you promise?”
“I promise I love you and I’ll always love you.”
Nini arrived with lovely news, or so she thought. Dixie Jane was invited to join her and Mr. Dorfman on a buying trip to New York. Afterward, they would take a “get acquainted” vacation at Saratoga Springs and the girl could bring a cousin or companion.
Dixie Jane imitated Amanda’s great composure at a farewell picnic and went off with her mother, quietly hiding her despair.
Amanda knew Dixie Jane was treating her mother with the same indifference she herself had shown Horace and Daisy. The breach could take years to mend, and oh, the vengeance of a ten-year-old girl certain she had been rejected and was about to be abandoned.
When Nini and Dixie Jane left Tobermory, Amanda could hear dizzying cycles of Daisy’s voice, uncommonly shrill . . . “Well, I hear that the Dorfmans own half of Richmond, but isn’t it cheeky of him to go off with Nini Constable and Dixie Jane to Saratoga Springs . . . Nini said nothing about a chaperon . . . but they are probably not going to have a proper announcement . . . There is a strong rumor that Dorfman is half Jewish or his late wife was Jewish or half Jewish or some such, never mind, Dixie Jane will come flying back to your arms, Amanda. Amanda. Amanda? Are you all right, dear?”
“I’ll miss her so.”
The elephant train, that march of the moguls, went into reverse as the seasonal visitors to Newport closed down their summer cottages and headed home for the winter.
Horace Kerr stuck to his promise to hold a family reunion at Tobermory over Thanksgiving, though he made that promise before he learned Zachary O’Hara had been stationed in Newport.
The summer had given Horace no cause