Thurston House Read online

  “I wouldn’t say that childbearing agrees with her much,” Hannah stated dryly. Camille had been unbearable since the day she’d arrived, and by April she was driving them both crazy. The weather had improved and it was a particularly lovely spring, but she seemed not to notice it at all, as she stormed around the house brooding and complaining. Even getting the nursery ready seemed not to give her much pleasure. She embroidered a few shirts, and bought the fabric for the curtains, but Hannah did the rest, knitting and sewing, and even making a beautiful bassinet for the baby. Every night, Jeremiah would take special delight in walking into the cheerful room, and handling the tiny socks and shirts, watching in wonderment as everything was readied. But as the time drew closer, again and again he found himself haunted by the memory of Mary Ellen. He had an unspoken terror that this child would be stillborn too, and Camille would torture him by doing everything he asked her not to do, walking alone by the creek, swinging from an old swing in a tree behind the house, and three weeks before the baby was due, she horrified Hannah as she took off in a fury one day and saddled a mule Jeremiah had long since retired from the mines and rode out into the neighboring vineyards because she was bored and tired of walking. Hannah was so upset that she told Jeremiah when he came home, and he rushed upstairs to berate Camille, but when he reached their bedroom, he realized there was no point. She was lying on their bed, strangely pale, and as he approached the bed, he saw her wince and her teeth were clenched as he bent to kiss her.

  “Are you all right, little love?” He was instantly worried. She didn’t look right, and there was a thin veil of perspiration on her brow.

  “I’m fine.” But she didn’t look it. She staunchly insisted on joining him at the dinner table that night, but she barely ate, and both Hannah and Jeremiah watched her. He sent her upstairs afterward to relax and this time she didn’t argue with him, instead she seemed grateful to go, and she was halfway up the stairs when she suddenly stopped and sank to her knees with a low moan. With a few short bounds he was on his knees beside her, and took her swiftly in his arms, as Hannah ran up the stairs behind him.

  “She’s in labor, Jeremiah. I knew it this afternoon. But when I asked her, she said she wasn’t having pains. It’s riding on that old mule that did it.”

  “Oh, hush up …” she snapped at Hannah, but not with her usual spirit, and Jeremiah suspected that Hannah was right. He lay Camille down on her bed and took a good look at her. She was deathly pale, and her hands were clenched, and she wore a strange, unfamiliar expression, as though she were in pain but didn’t want to admit it. And then, as though to prove it to them both, she attempted to get off the bed, but as soon as her feet touched the floor, her knees buckled beneath her and she cried out in pain, reaching wildly for Jeremiah, who scooped her up again and laid her on the bed, turning to address Hannah.

  “Ride Big Joe over to where Danny lives. He told me he’d ride for the doctor in Napa.” And suddenly Jeremiah regretted selecting a physician so far away. No matter how competent he was, if he didn’t get there in time, he wouldn’t do them any good, but it had never dawned on him that they would need him quickly. Hannah took off on swift feet, and in half an hour she was back, reporting that Danny had left for Napa. That meant that the doctor would be with them in five or six hours, and in the meantime, she went downstairs to boil water and roll clean rags, and make a pot of strong coffee for herself and Jeremiah. She didn’t feel sorry for Camille; she was young, and however painful it was, she would survive it, and there was a feeling of excitement in the air. The baby Jeremiah had waited for, for so long, was finally coming, and he seemed to feel the excitement too. He looked down at Camille with a tender smile as she clutched at his arm.

  “Don’t leave me, Jeremiah.…” She was panting now, and her face was contorted with the contractions. “Don’t leave me with Hannah … she hates me.…” She began to cry, and it was obvious that she was frightened. It was so different from Mary Ellen on her bed of pain, but she had been through it three times before and she had been so much older than this girl. Camille looked like a child now as she writhed in pain with each contraction. “Oh, make them stop … Jeremiah!… I can’t …”

  He felt sorry for her, but there was nothing he could do. He put damp cloths on her head until she threw them off, and she was clawing at his arm now. It had been four hours since Danny had left for Napa, and Jeremiah began praying that the doctor would come quickly. It didn’t seem as though it was going to go on much longer. And then suddenly, with horror, he remembered Mary Ellen, and the three days she had lain in childbirth. But that couldn’t happen to Camille. He wouldn’t let it. He began to look at his watch now, every few minutes, and Camille was holding his arm with one hand and clutching the brass headstead on the bed with the other, shrieking whenever the pains came, which was most of the time now. And Hannah finally came up with more coffee for him, but Camille didn’t even seem to notice her now.

  “Don’t you want me to stay with her?” She whispered. “You shouldn’t be in here.” She looked disapproving, but he had promised her he would stay until the doctor came and not leave her to Hannah. And he wanted to be there. It was a relief to be in the room and know what was going on. He would have gone mad if he’d had to wait outside. But when Danny returned three hours later, Jeremiah looked strained and exhausted.

  “The doc’s in San Francisco.” He looked grim as he reported to Jeremiah. Camille was clutching Hannah’s hands upstairs and screaming that she couldn’t bear the pain a moment longer, as Hannah tried to soothe her. “His wife said your baby is early.”

  “I know that,” he snapped at Danny. “What the hell is he doing in San Francisco?”

  The boy shrugged. “My ma sent me for the doc in St. Helena, but he’s in Napa delivering a baby.”

  “For chrissake … isn’t there anyone who could come?” And then he remembered the doctor in Calistoga and sent Danny in that direction, but that could take another hour, and as Jeremiah bounded up the stairs, he could hear Camille screaming. It was a horrendous guttural sound of pain, like a wounded animal keening, and he tore open the door and looked at Hannah with grim eyes.

  “Where’s the doctor?” she whispered, with worried eyes.

  “He’s not coming. I sent the boy to Calistoga to find the one up there. Good God, I hope he’s at home.” Hannah nodded as Camille howled again, tearing at her nightgown and thrashing on the bed in the warm night. But the three of them were already bathed in sweat from the tension.

  “Jeremiah … I think something’s wrong. Having them sharp as she is, the baby should be coming. I looked, but I don’t see anything there.” Jeremiah pursed his lips and watched his wife thrashing on the bed. There was no one coming to help, at least not for the moment, and he had no choice, he had to help her. Between the next pains, he gently spread her legs apart and she started to fight him, but she forgot his presence as soon as the next pain came, and he took a good look, hoping to see the head of their baby. But what he saw instead made him catch his breath, it was one tiny hand reaching down, where its head should have been pressing. The baby was turned around, just as Mary Ellen’s had been, and it might already be dead, or would be soon, if he didn’t do something. He remembered what he had seen the doctor do in Calistoga, and carefully instructed Hannah, who held Camille down mightily through the next few pains, as the girl shrieked as though she would die, and Jeremiah felt sure that he was killing her, but he had to do what he could to save their baby, and slowly, slowly, as he pressed the baby back up inside and felt for its head, he turned it. Its shoulders had been pressed at the opening, and now he could feel the head coming toward him. The bed was bathed with blood and Camille was almost too weak to scream, but she did, as the baby pushed slowly out from between her legs and into its father’s hands, giving a lusty wail as it did so.

  There was a tangle of cord around it and for a moment Jeremiah couldn’t tell if he had a son or a daughter, and then through the tears in his eyes, he saw mo
re clearly. “It’s a girl!” he shouted to Camille as she lifted her head wanly and began to cry, more from the horror of what she’d been through than any particular tenderness for the baby. She lay in her bed and moaned as Hannah attempted to clean her up, and she refused to hold the baby. And when the doctor came a little while later, he told Jeremiah he had done a fine job, and he gave Camille some drops that made her sleep, as Hannah crooned to the baby.

  “Got rid of them rings, I guess,” the doctor chuckled to Jeremiah as he left, and the proud papa laughed as he thanked the doctor and handed him a gold coin. He had planned to give it to the doctor from Napa, but with a stillbirth and now this, this man had earned it. It was thanks to his experience with Mary Ellen that Jeremiah had known how to turn this baby. And the doctor told him in no uncertain terms that he had saved the child’s life, although he admitted that doing something like that was rough on the mother. But it couldn’t be helped, and Jeremiah tried to explain that to her as he soothed her when she woke up. She was still half hysterical from what she’d been through, and she didn’t want to hold the baby. Jeremiah slipped a huge emerald ring on her finger, which he had been saving for this occasion. And he showed her the necklace and earrings and brooch that went with it, all perfectly matched, but she didn’t care. All she wanted was his promise that she’d never have to go through it again. It had been the worst experience of her life, and she told him, sobbing, that it would never have happened if he hadn’t raped her. It saddened him to see her reaction, but he knew that in a few days she’d be more herself again. Hannah wasn’t as sure, she’d never seen a woman refuse to hold her baby. And her daughter was four days old before Camille finally agreed to hold her, and a wet nurse had to be found in town, because Camille flatly refused to nurse her.

  “What’ll we call her, my love?”

  “I don’t know.” She sounded indifferent, and nothing he said seemed to cheer her. She refused to participate in the selection of names, never picked the child up, and feeling sorry for the little thing, Jeremiah almost constantly held her. He didn’t care that she wasn’t a son, she was his child, his flesh, the baby he had waited for, for so long, and suddenly he knew what Amelia had meant when she had urged him to get married and have babies. It was the most meaningful experience of his life and he adored the tiny bundle he held as often as he could. He would sit and stare at her in fascination, mesmerized by the delicate hands and the tiny features. He couldn’t tell who she looked like, but before she was a week old, he knew he wanted to name her Sabrina, and Camille didn’t seem to object. They christened her in St. Helena, Sabrina Lydia Thurston. It was Camille’s first outing, and she wore the emerald ring and a green summer dress, but she still felt weak, and she was furious that she couldn’t get into most of her dresses. Hannah told her it was much too soon to expect that, in an attempt to console her, but Camille brushed her off and ordered her from her room, telling her to take the baby with her.

  You could have cut the tension in the air with a knife during most of that summer. Camille was like a lionness in a cage, in the house in St. Helena, and the visions that Jeremiah had had of her crooning lullabies to their child was far from the reality of the nervous young girl, itching to get back to city life as she watched the weeks tick by. He had promised her a trip to New York and Atlanta, but when her mother fell ill in July, her father wrote and said that they had best wait until Christmas, and as was her habit now, Camille flew into a rage and threw a lamp to the floor before stalking off to her room and slamming the door. She hated everything and everyone, the house, the country, the people, Hannah, the baby, and even Jeremiah fell prey to her ill temper. It was a relief for everyone when they packed up in September, and Camille finally left for the city she had so desperately missed. She felt as though she were being let out of prison.

  “Seven months!” she breathed in disbelief as she walked into the front hall of their city home. “Seven months!”

  “We missed you!” her friends said.

  “It was the worst time of my life,” she told them in return, “a nightmare!” And unbeknownst to Jeremiah she went to a doctor and acquired some more rings and a special rinse, as well as a good supply of slippery elm, which was an effective contraceptive too, and nothing he would ever say again would deter her from using those precautions. She had not, in any case, resumed having intercourse with him since Sabrina’s birth, and she was in no hurry to do so. She didn’t want to take any chances. The baby was four months old now, bright and pretty and alert, with soft curls, and big blue eyes like Camille’s and Jeremiah’s, and tiny chubby little hands and grasping fingers, but it was seldom that Camille visited her child, and she had opted not to use the handsome nursery on the same floor as her rooms, but had put the baby on the third floor instead.

  “She makes too much noise,” she had explained to Jeremiah, who was disappointed not to have the baby nearer to their rooms. But he wasn’t shy about going upstairs to see her. He adored the child, and made no secret of it. The only one who appeared not to was Camille. She brushed it off when Jeremiah said something to her, but by the time the baby was six months old, he was genuinely worried. Camille had never warmed up to her, and as the child grew older, she would know it. It was unnatural for Camille to show so little feeling for her child, yet she seemed to feel nothing for her. All she cared about was the time she spent with her friends, the parties they gave or the small festivities she organized at Thurston House when Jeremiah was in Napa. He had told her he didn’t like her friends, so she saw them alone now, and ever since he’d gotten her pregnant, her feelings toward him seemed much cooler. There were times when he wondered if she would ever forgive him, and most of the time it seemed doubtful.

  “Give it time,” Amelia told him when he confessed his concern during her next visit. She held Sabrina and cooed and laughed with her, and it struck Jeremiah like a rock, as he thought of the differences between the two women. “Maybe she’s afraid of little babies.” She saw the look in his eyes. “I have three grandchildren after all.” The third had finally been a boy and there was great rejoicing in her daughter’s household, but she still found time to visit Jeremiah and Camille, though Camille was out when she came this time, as she was most of the time now. She seemed to have no time at all to spend with her husband and daughter, and the only time she was at home at all was when she was giving a party or having a ball, and Jeremiah was getting tired of it. She liked the public role of being Mrs. Jeremiah Thurston, and the attendant comforts and grandeur, but none of the private duties that went with it. And Jeremiah was getting tired of not sleeping with his wife. Claiming that she still felt ill, she was sleeping in her dressing room now, and had been since they returned from Napa. But she was never too ill to go to parties. Jeremiah didn’t dare tell Amelia all of it, but she sensed it from the things he didn’t say, and she felt sorry for him as she kissed him good-bye. He deserved better than that … she would have been happy to give him far better than that, had things worked out differently than they had. But she had been too old for him, or so she thought, and she was happy that he had Sabrina.

  But at Christmastime, Jeremiah drew the line. Camille told him in November that she wanted to give a huge ball then, for six or seven hundred people, “the biggest ball ever, given in San Francisco,” she cheerfully said, and he looked at her and shook his head.

  “No.”

  “Why not?” Fury walked slowly into her eyes. She was Mrs. Jeremiah Thurston, and she wanted everything that went with it.

  “We’re going to Napa for Christmas.” Her mother wasn’t better yet, and her father didn’t think they should come to Atlanta. Camille didn’t seem particularly concerned about her mother. It was no secret that she didn’t like her. But she would have liked going to Atlanta to play the grand lady and thumb her nose in their faces.

  “Napa?” She shrieked. “Napa? For Christmas? Over my dead body.” There were those by then who would have thought that a pleasure, but Jeremiah was not yet among t
hem.

  “I have to be near the mines, there’ve been floods again …” Recently, John Harte had lost twenty-two out of the hundred and six men who worked for him, and Jeremiah had gone to help him. Harte, who had finally begun to mellow, was grateful.

  She cut him off. “Then you go to Napa. I’ll stay here.”

  “For Christmas?” He was shocked. “I want the three of us to be together.”

  “Who? You, me, and Hannah? Count me out, Jeremiah.”

  “I was referring to our daughter”—he grabbed her arm in an unfamiliar show of frustration—“or had you forgotten we have one?”

  “That’s an unnecessary remark. I see her every day.”

  “When? On your way out the door as she comes in from the garden?”

  “I’m not a wet nurse, Jeremiah.” She looked haughtily at him from her diminutive height, and for once the dam broke in Jeremiah.

  “You’re not a mother either. Or a wife, for that matter. Just exactly what are you?” And with that she reached out and slapped him, and he stood watching her. Neither of them moved. It was the beginning of the end of their marriage and they both knew it. Camille was the first to speak, but not to apologize to her husband. Something in her had snapped months before, when she had the baby, or when she was trapped in Napa, as she saw it. In truth, she would never forgive him for making her have Sabrina. But there was more to it than that. She had wanted to share the excitement of his business life, only to discover that there was no room for her at the mines in Napa. It was an exclusively male world and he didn’t even tell her about it. In exchange, she wanted his presence at her constant round of parties, and he failed her there, shying away from social life, as he always had, and refusing to show off with her. In truth, she had none of what she wanted, except the grandeur of Thurston House itself, and all it meant to her.