All the champagne I’d consumed seemed to have drained from my veins, and I felt horribly sober. I couldn’t be alone with my thoughts in the cabin, but I didn’t want to be around any of our guests either. I walked through the towering pines to the farm to find Jose or Eugene. I’d asked Eugene to organize a group hike the following day, and I thought I’d take my mind off things by checking on the itinerary. He wasn’t there. No one was there, in fact.
There were eggs in the coop, but I wouldn’t have anything to carry them in on my way to the kitchen. I’d hoped to see Lady in the stable, but she was out in the field with the other horses. She looked rounder, her stomach fuller and dropping.
“Can I help you with something?” Eugene asked, startling me as he rounded the horse stable with a bucket and a rake, sleeves rolled up, galoshes caked in mud.
“Oh, you gave me a start!”
“I apologize, ma’am. I was just refilling the horses’ feed.”
“I was only wondering how Lady’s feeling.”
“She’s started walking about quite a bit now,” he said. “Doesn’t want to stand still, you see that?” He pointed out to the field, and sure enough she was pacing. “That could mean a couple of days or even less now,” he said. “I think after today we’ll have to separate her from the rest.”
“Why?” I asked.
“If she foals with the other horses around, they might get too close. We had a mare foal a few years back and the male got up close and stepped on the little one’s leg. We had to put her to sleep before the foal was even a few hours old, very sad day that was.”
“Oh, Eugene,” I said, suddenly overcome with sadness. “That’sjust terrible.” A chill came over me and I looked around to see where I could sit for a minute.
“It was sad,” he said, beginning to rake out the stable. “Sorry.…” He looked back at me, seeing the pain in my face. “Sorry, you see things like that happen all the time when you’re with the animals this much, probably a bit startling to regular folk. Have I upset you?”
“No, no, I’m fine. I’m sure you see all kinds of things.” I felt a sudden desperation to get back to the privacy of my cabin. “Let me know how it goes with Lady,” I called out as I backed away. “I’d like to know when things start happening.” I walked briskly back to the cabin, hoping I wouldn’t see anyone.
I couldn’t get through the door quickly enough. I shut it behind me, bolted it and then, wrenched by heavy sobs, crumpled to the floor. Everyone was here at the camp—my friends, my theater girls, Alberto, my parents, even my brothers. Archie would be here in just a few days, and our wedding plans were coming together. My grand finale would be a huge success and a final celebration of my time as a Ziegfeld girl, and yet everything felt so horribly, horribly sad. I loved Archie so very much, but I was leading him, unknowing, into a trap. Into a cruel, deceitful lie.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
It was two weeks before the wedding. The sunbathing roof deck was complete, the cabins freshly painted, seven of the sixteen bathtubs had been shipped and pulled up the banks to the cabins by some thirty men, then installed. The rest would have to wait. A steamboat full of orchids would arrive from Manhattan a few days prior to the wedding, along with a shipment of hooch. The only thing left for me to do was go for a final fitting of my wedding gown in Manhattan and bring it back to the camp.
That and my final performance.
Archie had been at the camp with us for the past two weeks, rolling up his sleeves and working with the staff to ensure that everything would be perfect. While he’d originally planned to join me in Manhattan for my final send-off, he now needed to stay behind and await the special delivery by way of Canada to ensure that our wedding wouldn’t be dry. I understood the precariousness of the situation; it would be a middle-of-the-night delivery and Archiefelt he should be there in case of any mishaps. So I asked Alberto to accompany me to the city, and we’d be back before the guests arrived for the wedding.
We took Archie’s railcar—it had been put to great use that summer, shuttling our friends back and forth. Alberto’s friends Chester and Michael also rode back to town with us. We were all dog-tired from the week’s activities. As soon as the first leg of the trip was complete, Chester said he planned to sleep the rest of the way. I probably could have benefited from the sleep, too, given all the wild parties I’d been throwing, but I was too eager for my performance. I’d have three days to rehearse and then, showtime.
Alberto and I sat at the table and chairs by the window. I tried to read a story in an old issue ofMcClure’s,but I kept reading the same few lines over and over.
“Archie is a good man, Olive, very welcoming,” Alberto said. “Nice of him to put up with all of ourcanto forte.”
“I know, he’s very patient.” I thought of all the late nights by the fire, Alberto, his friends, and me singing our lungs out. “Though he has to allow me to let it out somewhere, especially now that I’m giving up the stage.”
Alberto shook his head. “You told me when we first met on the lake, that you would never give it up, you said he would never ask you to.”
“I know.” I nodded. “I didn’t think he would.” I looked out the window and sighed. “But things are different now. I didn’t know back then that I would be in love with him the way I am now. I didn’t know that I’d want this life, companionship. Until I met Archie, Ihonestly thought it wasn’t for me. But now I can’t imagine my life without him.”
Just this week Archie had spent two full days pitching in with the workers, painting the guide boats, repairing loose boards on the deck and making sure all the chairs at the boathouse were in good shape for picnics. He told me he wanted everything to be perfect for me and all my guests.
“I don’t want a lifetime of flings, Alberto. Now I know what’s possible, and I don’t want to lose him. Don’t you want that kind of companionship, especially as we get older?”
Alberto looked thoughtful. I followed his gaze to the sleeper carriage, where Chester was resting. We’d never spoken of such things, but I knew there was more than a simple friendship between them.
“Sometimes you can’t have everything that you want,” he said.
I understood what he meant, but it wasn’t my place to press him to tell me more.
“Will you have children, Olive?” His question got my attention, and I turned, silent, to face him. Alberto waited patiently for me to answer.
“No,” I said in a whisper.
