O'hara's Choice - Leon Uris [112]
Horace sat upright suddenly and grimaced.
“Where the hell is Amanda?”
“She went to the theater in Providence and called late last night. She missed her train and stayed over with the Burtons. I expect her momentarily.”
Horace wished to protest further, but loud voice and movement were accompanied by sharp pain.
“I have a surprise for you, meanwhile,” Daisy said, and pulled the service cord.
In a moment two servants entered. One carried a small covered painting, the other an easel, and set them up before Horace.
Daisy drew the cover off. It was a rendering for the portrait Amanda had sat for in her Constitution Ball gown. The artist, John Singer Sargent, had sent it to Inverness for comment, and Daisy brought it back with her.
Horace studied and studied. “Splendid, well done,” he said softly. “But no one could ever truly capture her radiance that night. She was ethereal.”
Daisy understood she would be demoted to the old dowager mother. She’d known that for a long time, but loved Amanda no less than she loved Upton and Emily; in fact, she rather gloried in her daughter’s independence.
A finished portrait of this rendering would be a powerful statement of Amanda’s ascension. Daisy would handle it gracefully.
Horace leaned back and took a critic’s view of the canvas. He nitpicked here and there. Damned Sargent charged an arm and leg for the commission but was obviously worth it. Horace looked quickly to his wife, then turned his eyes away. Where will we hang the portrait? He dared not say; she dared not ask.
“Father,” Amanda said, breezing in and over to embrace him.
“No, no,” he said, “I’m a little banged up.”
“The news of Lochinvar is already up to Providence. You’ve set a few fellows on their ears.”
“Really? What are they saying?”
“Mr. Burton said that you’re something out of Viking mythology.”
Horace rumbled for joy in the back of his throat.
“Dear, I brought up a rendering of your portrait from Baltimore,” Daisy said.
Amanda studied it approvingly. She had instructed Sargent to cover the sadness he had detected. He’d done so, quite well. Amanda smiled to her mother to convey that she would not let Horace take Daisy’s portrait down from the grand entry.
“The Butterfly?”
“I’ll tell you about that later,” he said. “I was hoping you’d be at dockside to see me in.”
“I missed the ten o’clock train last night out of Providence. The Burtons put me up.”
“Oh, yes. Did Daisy say something about the theater? In Providence? In December?”
“It was Brown University and it was a lecture. Dr. Hoftsaddler gave the most extraordinary talk about the possibility of human life on planets beyond our solar system.”
“Nonsense,” Horace said. “I’ve heard those old wives’ tales from every seaman who works at the Hook. Hoftsaddler? Well, you know those Germans, always seeing elves in their woods.”
There seemed an awkward moment as Horace adjusted himself in his great chair. Daisy could usually feel an Amanda strike coming on before Horace caught it, and she’d rather be elsewhere.
“Why don’t I see to a little tea or something. Soup?”
“Now that we three are together; so many things have gone past us recently, I am filled with a great sense of—what?” Horace said. “A great sense of comfort after an arduous journey. I don’t mean Lochinvar. I mean all of us. If I were a Catholic I’d say I’d passed through purgatory, though God knows what my sins might have been.”
Daisy touched his shoulder and he made a kissing gesture to her.
“This sail to Immigrant Reef was the climax of a summer that has restored my faith, revived my spirit as only could happen at the helm during a storm.
“It told me,” he went on, “that indeed the Kerrs are made of sterner stuff. I must say Donald and Malcolm acquitted themselves well. But it is Amanda I speak of now. You, my darling, have shown great resources in turning back raw savage lust. I know you must have called upon every fiber of your being. The road to Jerusalem, to Rome, is always paved in broken glass.