one to be too concerned with personal appearance—rugged work makes for rugged men, as the saying went—he had to admit that he was looking more haggard these days; something, without a doubt, the rarified Contessa Da Rimini and the aristocratic ladies of her Italian Riviera circle would never have tolerated.
Easy to blame it on the long, hard hours out at the Beaumont field and the uncertainties of securing the necessary financing, but the faded luster in his intense, blue eyes told him it was something else.
Within a few months of his arrival the exotic allure of European women had already started to fade. Their perfumed finery and seductive glances slowly replaced, as he feared it would be, by his cherished memories of Gabrielle.
Bret closed his eyes. Although it had been over two years it sometimes seemed like only yesterday they were together. Gabrielle Mavis Caldwell, the clever, impetuous, and stunningly beautiful daughter of cotton magnate Arley Falkner Caldwell. How long ago had it been now since they watched the treetops stir with the whisper of a warming breeze?
Bret let his mind drift back to the spring of ’89, when the countryside around Galveston had been verdant, unblemished. In the early morning, faint puffs of vapor hung over freshly ploughed fields. He saw himself strolling through that beautifully wooded section of the waterfront park near the boardwalk with its low, rolling hills intersected by a clean running stream flowing to the Gulf.
He had first seen Gabrielle sitting on the bank looking into the cool spring water. Her long, bright auburn hair, tied back and pinned, gleamed with deep, gorgeous red shadows under her parasol.
Concealed in her summer finery he sensed a slim, wild beauty with hips that tapered smoothly into long, straight legs. Gabrielle looked up at him with warm brown eyes, flecked with gold that seemed to sparkle on the surface of the rippling mirror.
Bret lowered his eyes and shook his head. But that was all in the carefree past of another century. Those thoughts and feelings had no place in the shrewd, levelheaded business of the new millennium.
After hot coffee, a hot shave was all a man needed to set things right. While he was in town tomorrow he’d get a haircut and buy a few new shirts, and anything else that struck his fancy. Bret rose naked from bed. He stretched and walked up to the huge bay window of his bedroom.
Parting the fine white muslin drapes he gazed out on the Gulf of Mexico shimmering in the endless blue under the brilliant summer sun beating down on the sandy beaches of Galveston.
Bret gazed down at the gently swelling waves reflecting the beauty of the cloudless sky. A group of young women dressed in their brightest Gibson girl tailored shirtwaist blouses and long skirts giggled and laughed as they plodded across the sparkling white sand clutching their parasols, beach umbrellas, and wicker picnic baskets.
Bret winced from the intensity of the sunlight and stepped back. How long had it been since he enjoyed an untroubled, relaxing day at the beach?
Was it with Gabrielle?
He closed his eyes, letting the healing rays burn away the last remaining darkness of his dreams.
CHAPTER 4
Saturday, August 25
Gabrielle fanned herself as she sipped iced tea on the veranda of her family home. She was barely listening to the men discussing politics and business but still kept a keen ear open for any comment or important piece of news that could help her family’s business.
On a summer day such as this, she much preferred the vivid bloom of the rosebushes that accented the bright pinks and yellows of the freshly painted homes on each side of the clean, wide street.
It went without saying, of course, that Blue Haven, her family’s grand, Beaux Arts-style mansion, was one of the more magnificent homes overlooking the Gulf, although some would say her father had close competition when speaking of the McGowan’s property.
But few people cared to speak of the McGowans these days in polite company.
Gabrielle stared at the shining water brimming with sailing boats and pleasure yachts enjoying the late summer sun. In the heat she was glad to have her hair pinned under her hat in a small coiffure of French twists that suited her dollish curls. A few loose, long tendrils brushed against the soft, blushing rose of her cheek.
In the distance, the bustling waterfront was crowded with cargo ships and commercial fishing boats. Before her mother fell ill, she used to bring Gabrielle to the dock