The Prince of Spies (Hope and Glory #3) - Elizabeth Camden Page 0,15
her bedroom.
“Mama, please,” Marianne urged. “Please put the trunk back. Papa will be home soon and will be able to explain everything.”
At least she hoped he would. Clyde had been in Baltimore to meet with his constituents and was supposed to have returned last night, and Vera suspected the worst.
Her mother opened the lid of the trunk to throw a handful of Clyde’s shirts inside. “He’s with that woman,” she wept. “I called home twice last night and the butler had no explanation for where he was. He’s with her! Her and that child.”
“Shh,” Marianne said. “Sam might overhear.” Her nephew was visiting them again, and he was too young to learn about Clyde’s infidelities.
It was impossible to know why Clyde had overstayed his visit to Baltimore, but it might well have been to see his young son, who was now eighteen months old. Clyde refused to cut ties with the boy’s mother because of the child they shared. He swore the affair was over, but he set Lottie O’Grady up in her own house and paid monthly support for her and the baby.
Vera normally insisted on accompanying Clyde whenever business called him to Baltimore, but she had been feeling poorly last Friday, and Clyde swore on a stack of Bibles that he would behave himself. His failure to return last night awakened all of Vera’s fears.
Vera threw some trousers atop the shirts, then dumped Clyde’s shoes into the trunk. “I won’t raise another illegitimate child. I won’t! I shouldn’t have agreed to it the first time.”
Marianne looked away. She loved her mother, but sometimes Vera could be so thoughtless, and it hurt. Vera noticed and immediately switched tones.
“Not that I regret it, darling! Come, give Mama a nice big hug.” She dragged Marianne into her arms. “You know I don’t mean anything by it. I love you like one of my own.”
Marianne had always known Vera adopted her. As a child she had been told that her real mother died, but that wasn’t true. Her real mother had an affair with Clyde and had been paid handsomely to surrender the baby to the Magruders. Clyde wanted more children, but the doctor warned that Vera could never carry another baby after the trauma of her only son’s birth. Clyde never asked Vera if she would accept another child, he simply presented his wife with the three-month-old baby from his short-lived affair with an opera singer. Although Clyde doted on her, there was always a hint of tension where Vera was concerned. They could go months in loving harmony, but then something could trigger Vera’s insecurities, and the coldness returned.
And that “something” had reared its head eighteen months ago when Clyde was caught in another affair. This time there was a little boy named Tommy as a result. At first Clyde tried to hide Tommy’s existence from Vera, but she found out, and their entire family had been walking on eggshells ever since.
“Don’t frown, Marianne, it will make those grooves on your face permanent,” Vera coaxed. “Smile! There’s my pretty girl. A lady must always pay careful attention to her complexion.” As if taking her own advice, Vera blotted away her tears and reached for a box of powder to begin repairing her face.
“Shall I hang Papa’s clothes back in the wardrobe?” Marianne asked. The bedroom looked like a bomb had exploded, with drawers hanging open and clothing mounded atop the open trunk.
Vera’s fingers stilled, but only for a moment. “Leave everything right there. If he returns today, he can see evidence of what he’s put me through. And if he doesn’t return today, I shall finish packing the trunk.”
The sight of the chaotic bedroom was a painful window into what Vera must have gone through twenty-six years ago when Marianne arrived as an infant in the Magruder household. Why couldn’t she have come from a normal family? It seemed there was always drama. A lawsuit, an affair, a scandal. The family patriarch, Jedidiah Magruder, had been born in a cabin with a dirt floor. He had a third-grade education, scars on his body from childhood labor, and a bottomless well of ambition leading to an aggressive style of business that always skirted the edges of legality. Everyone respected Jedidiah, even though he was too old to run the company anymore. Clyde had been in charge for a decade but had to step down when he was elected to Congress. Her older brother, Andrew, now led the company.