Page 35 of The Dravenhearst Brides
“Where?”
“Just there.” Ruth pointed. “The cottage beyond the stables, near the edge of the property. That’s where I live.” She cast a wary eye back to the manor, lurking over Margot’s shoulder like a gargoyle. “I no longer keep a room in the main house. I prefer my own space.”
“Of course.” Margot wiggled her arm free. “I’ll keep that in mind.” She located the stone cottage in the distance, surrounded by flowering bushes. A small garden flanked the side, a veranda before the front door.
“Please do. Anytime, even if you’d just like to share a cup of tea in the afternoon. Babette and I did that often. She adored a good tea party…or gin rickeys on the porch in the summer.”
“She sounds larger than life.” Margot shifted her stance, the question on the tip of her tongue. “I’m wondering…how exactly did she die?”
Ruth’s face fell still.
“I don’t mean to be impertinent,” Margot said, the words coming quickly. “It’s only—”
“It’s okay to be curious.” Ruth’s frozen features broke. “I’d be concerned if you weren’t.” A fleeting glance to meet Margot’s eyes, then away. “Babette struggled after marrying Richard. She enjoyed the role of wife in theory, more so the role of hostess. She thrived as the center of attention. But in the moments between, the day-to-day management of the estate, stepping into her role as Merrick’s mother…she floundered.”
Ruth looked into the distance before continuing. “High as a kite one day, radiant as the sun, making you feel privileged just to stand in her light. But then the next…she’d be unable to get out of bed. Curtains pulled. Door closed. She called them ‘fits of the sullens,’ and she blamed them on many things—Richard, the house, the gin rickeys…” Ruth smiled, remembering, then shook her head. “Maybe it was everything. Maybe it was none of those things. Maybe there’s a cost to shining so bright. If she was truly a star, she was a very fickle one indeed.”
“I see.” But Margot pursed her lips, unsure whether she really saw at all.
“No, you don’t.” Ruth’s brows dipped. “But you will. Her death was a tragedy, but by her own hands. Babette died by suicide. She took her own life.”
12
July 8, 1900
Ruth,
Don’t wear pink tonight, but don something equally stunning.
We’ll be the brightest stars in Louisville.
Love Always,
Babette
Therewouldbenosleep that night, Margot was sure of it. Not one wink. The humidity was oppressive, and her thoughts swirled with visions of Babette. Visions of Dravenhearst Manor lit not by sparse candlelight but the buzzing live wire of electricity. Glittering ballgowns and grand parties. The images played on the back of Margot’s feverishly warm eyelids like a silent film at the picture shows.
A sharp sound cut through the night, a rumbling outside the manor. Familiar. Her eyes sprang open.
She dashed to the balcony just in time to watch the roadster pull an about-face in the circle drive, Merrick in the driver’s seat.
Sneaking out. For the second time this week, third or fourth since their wedding. She’d lost count.
It felt like defeat, like the worst kind of shame. The soft depths of the bed called to her. The laudanum on the nightstand even more so.
But laudanum wasn’t the only thing on the nightstand tonight. Dinner had been the usual solitary affair, but when Margot returned to her room, she discovered two surprises—an envelope with her name on it, presumably a return letter from her father, and a crystal vase filled with blue hydrangeas. She knew those flowers; they were from Greenbrier Estates. Only one person could have brought them.
Her darling, adulterous husband.
Margot crossed the room on sleepwalker’s feet, then bent down to sniff the heavy blooms. They’d been Ma’s favorite, these flowers, and against herself—against the ingrained impulse to have nothing in common with her mother—Margot had always loved them too.
It was unexpected of him to bring a bouquet back for her. Thoughtful. She’d been buoyed by the gesture, but those hopes were quickly dashed, run over by the roadster’s squealing tires as her husband absconded yet again in the middle of the night.
Who is she, this other woman?It seemed critically important to know.
Margot grabbed recklessly for the laudanum as she tumbled back to bed. She tilted the bottle to her lips and drank deeply, relishing the bitter tincture on her tongue. It tasted like salvation. Like some goddamn peace and quiet.
She nestled into the sheets, wanting to disappear in the blissful abyss of unconsciousness. She certainly didn’t want to remain here, her thoughts swimming with jealous resentment. Here she was, nearly a month a bride, her marriage bed cold. Unconsummated. Dying a slow death by neglectful asphyxiation, day after day.
