Chapter Seven

Back m Rose Cottage, everything was in a turmoil. The tea sat, stone cold, in the teapot in the parlor. Sara had fled to her room, with Olivia close behind her, and Hetty stormed up and down the parlor alone, with no one to vent her anger on.

Olivia was worried about Sara, for the sight of Sara in tears was a rare one around Rose Cottage. Quietly, Olivia padded down the hail, hesitated outside Sara’s door and finally knocked.

“Come in,” said a thin voice from inside.

Olivia, who hated scenes, pushed the door open and glided inside, afraid of what she might find. She discovered Sara engaged in packing her bags. Dresses were laid out on chairs, the big wardrobe in the corner of the room yawned open, and the drawers of the bureau revealed camisoles and petticoats spilling over the edge. The sight filled Olivia with instant chagrin. The open suitcases brought home reality in a way all Blair’s and Hetty’s words had been unable to. It really was true! Sara would be gone from Rose Cottage in the morning!

“Sara, you should be in bed by now. You can finish packing in the morning,” Olivia gently told her.

Sara kept right on stuffing items into her luggage. Sleep was the furthest thing from her mind. Within the last few hours she’d been tossed up and down on such a roller coaster of happiness and dismay that she felt she might not be interested in sleeping again for weeks to come.

“Why do Aunt Hetty and Papa hate each other so much?” she demanded of Olivia, at the same time trying to fold her best cream dress with all the tucks down the front and edgings of lace. She had worn that very dress when she had given the narration at the Avonlea magic lantern show. The show had been a triumph, winning the admiration of the people of Avonlea and drawing Jasper Dale out of seclusion to run the projector. It was mainly because of that show, which Sara had organized, that Jasper had got up the courage to be Olivia’s photographer and...oh, why was everything so suddenly all mixed up?

Sara flung the dress down on the bedspread and turned to Olivia, confused by the mysteries of adult behavior and pained at having two of the people most dear to her at loggerheads. Olivia sucked in a deep breath and tried to explain.

“Oh, it’s senseless, Sara. Hetty blames him for taking your mother away from us, and some people just can’t let go of a hurt. Seems like the longer they hold onto it, the larger it becomes.”

This explanation didn’t hold out a lot of hope for improving matters. Both Sara and Olivia knew that Hetty was a woman of unbending principles and even more unbending willpower. Once Hetty made up her mind about something, it was practically impossible to make her change it—a characteristic that had caused more than a few storms at Rose Cottage. Very clearly, Sara saw what it all could mean. For all her youth, Sara often had extraordinary insights into other people’s character.

“If we leave tomorrow, then they’ll always hate each other, forever.”

The last word echoed through the room as dolefully as a funeral bell, and Olivia could not disagree. Her bosom heaved with a sigh.

“Well, there are some things you just can’t change, Sara.”

This wasn’t exactly the sort of comfort Sara had hoped for from Olivia. It wasn’t very reassuring to have one’s grown-up aunt as much as saying things were hopeless.

“I’m frightened, Aunt Olivia,” Sara got out, her voice small and her eyes huge with everything Rose Cottage had come to mean to her. “I’m frightened that if we leave tomorrow, I’ll never be able to come back here.”

Olivia enfolded Sara in a big hug, unable to say out loud that she was afraid of the same thing.

“Oh, Sara, you can always come back here, whenever you want...even if I have to go to Montreal and get you.”

“It wouldn’t be the same, though,” Sara murmured mournfully against Olivia’s shoulder. “I’d just be a visitor, and visitors never get treated the same as real family.”

Olivia embraced Sara even more tightly. Her own heart was swelling up so much she felt it in danger of bursting her bodice buttons. With Hetty ruling the household with such an iron hand, Olivia sometimes felt as young as Sara. And it was as though, in Sara, she had gained a very dear little sister instead of just a niece.

“I promise...that will never happen,” Olivia pledged vehemently. “Our feelings for you will never change, no matter where you are.”

Down the lane from Rose Cottage, in the King kitchen, Alec and Blair had pretty well consumed the brandy in the teacups. Blair had calmed down and been restored, at least temporarily, to rational conversation. Man to man, he set about describing his affairs to his brother-in-law.

“I still have controlling interest in the company,” he said, explaining what he had salvaged from the financial disaster brought on by his fraudulent partner. “And I’ve managed to hold on to the house.”

It was just like Blair to bounce back from the fiasco and come out fighting. Blair was a self-made man. And, like most self-made men, he was given to bold, decisive action, blithely taking on all odds in order to succeed. It had been this dashing side of him that had laid siege to Ruth King and swept her off her feet. It was this side of him that made him assume he could just hustle Sara back to her former life without any consequences. And it was this side of him that roused Hetty to battle.

He had made himself rich once before and, from the determined glint in his eyes, it was clear he meant to recover from his setback and make himself rich once again. And he wanted to get started on the process as soon as possible.

Alec nodded sagely, as though Blair’s world of high finance and fast-moving international business deals were quite as familiar to him as his own barnyard. Why, a few more sips of brandy and he might start thinking of taking up high finance himself.

“Ah...well, if you need help, we’ve put a little aside, and if you can use it, it’s there for you and Sara.”

It was as natural as breathing for the King clan to stick together and try to help each other. Blair was moved but too proud even to consider the offer.

“Thank you, Alec, that’s very kind, but I have every intention of building the company back up, and that’s another reason why I want to get back to Montreal as soon as possible.”

This statement got them right back to the main problem: the sudden and totally unexpected uprooting of Sara from what she had come to regard as her home. Janet had charged Alec with doing something about it and he knew he had better try soon or he might never hear the end of it from his wife. Clearing his throat, Alec decided upon a cautiously diplomatic, slantwise approach.

“Now, if you don’t mind my sayings you know, courtrooms give a man a certain pallor. You’d do yourself a lot of good to stay here for a few days, let the Island rejuvenate you. Well, I can help smooth things over with Hetty,” he offered recklessly—no doubt under the influence of the brandy. “But, uh...you got to give Sara some time She’s got a lot of farewells to make.”

The only result of this speech was to make Blair resolute again.

“I’m sorry I’ve agonized over this and I believe it’s for the best.”

A quick, short chop of the ties, that’s what Blair believed would be the least painful. Besides, it would quickly get him out of range of Hetty King. From the first day he had shown up to court Ruth, Hetty had been the thorn among the roses. She had never liked him or accepted him.

From the recent explosion at Rose Cottage, he was certain she never would.

Alec supposed he ought to argue some more, but, with Blair’s mind so adamantly made up, he couldn’t think of anything further to say. All he could do was lift one hand in a conciliating gesture.

“All right, I won’t say another word.”

Good thing too, for footsteps creaked on the kitchen stairs and Janet’s voice floated down.

“Alec?”

“Whoops!”

The brandy bottle! If Janet suspected he and Blair had been sitting here drinking, he knew he’d never hear the end of it. Grabbing up the incriminating evidence, Alec scrambled onto the chair again, almost dropping the bottle twice before shoving it back atop the cupboard into its hiding place. Luck was with him, however. When Janet returned to the kitchen, she found the two sitting innocuously at the table before a pair of empty teacups.

“Alec... oh, Blair—well, your room’s all ready for you, and I’ve put out some fresh towels.” Janet had taken a deliberately long time upstairs in order to give the men time to talk. Now all she wanted was to get the details from Alec.

“Thank you,” Blair said, discovering again that family hospitality was always better than the finest hotel. “I certainly hope I haven’t put you out, Janet—or the children.”

Janet waved her hand airily.

“Oh, no. The four of them are quite comfortable I think it’s a bit of an adventure.”

“Well, goodnight, then,” said Blair, getting to his feet. “And thank you for the, um… advice, Alec.”

“Any time, Blair.”

Wearier from the tensions of the day than he wanted to admit, Blair took himself up the stairs. Janet waited until he was out of earshot and then turned eagerly to her husband, whose calm expression she misinterpreted completely.

“Good for you. So he did listen,” she declared with satisfaction.

“Listen?” Alec dragged his attention abruptly from the depths of the empty teacup. “Oh, well, no...”

“What?”

“He’s still planning on leaving first thing in the morning,” Alec informed her, bracing himself.

At once, Janet became agitated again. She tugged at her apron, did a half-turn around the kitchen table, then stopped beside the chair Blair had vacated, fortunately not catching the pungent scent rising from the cup left behind.

“Oh...then Hetty’s the problem,” she muttered, approaching the matter from yet another angle. “You’ve got to talk to Hetty, Alec. It’s the only way to straighten this out.”

Hurriedly remembering it was his bedtime too, Alec rose up from the table. In hopes of getting hazardous ideas out of Janet’s mind, he patted her arm.

“Janet, calm down! It’s late. I’m tired.”

Alec’s voice inadvertently covered the commotion upstairs. The minute Blair had disappeared into his room and the coast was clear, all the children had leaped out of bed again and swarmed back to the top of the stairs. It had been torture, lying still and faking sleep while Janet had puttered around, tucking in the covers and folding clothes. Not only that, they had missed all the conversation between Blair and Alec, and now they had a ton of stuff to get caught up on.

The children no sooner got themselves settled behind the newel post than Alec headed for the front hall, Janet at his heels. Suppressing groans, the children all got up again and crept as fast as they could along the hail to the front stairs where they knelt against the railing.

All Alec wanted to do was escape to bed, but his wife was having none of it. It was perfectly clear to her, if to no one else, that if things weren’t smoothed out very soon, Sara would be gone— and then where would they be? To prevent a permanent rupture in the family, she set her mouth and turned up the pressure on Alec.

“Oh, well, I don’t know Alec,” she sighed. “I used to think I’d married the head of the family, but now I’m beginning to wonder who does wear the trousers on this farm—you or Hetty.”

“There’s a time and place for everything, dear,” Alec returned, as mildly as he could, as he put his foot on the bottom stair. “I’ll go over in the morning.”

“In the morning!” Any fool could see that any action in the morning would be too little too late, “Sara will be gone. Go over now and tell Hetty what you think.”

Alec grasped the stair rail, listening to the cold wind blowing about outside.

“I’m not going to go over to Rose Cottage to rant and rave at Hetty at this hour.”

“Why not?” Janet wanted to know. “Unless, of course, you’re still afraid of Hetty.”

There really was going to be no end to this unless Alec did what Janet wanted. Defeated, he threw up his hands in exasperation and reached for his overcoat.