"I am hoping it will all be settled satisfactorily soon," said Dolly De
Castro to Alice one afternoon a few weeks afterward. She had invited
Alice out from town for a fortnight at Black Rock while MacBirney, with
McCrea and the active partners of the Kimberly interests were working on
the negotiations for the purchase of the MacBirney factories.
"And when it is settled, I can congratulate you, I think, my dear, most
sincerely on any issue that associates your husband and his interests
with those of my brothers."
"Indeed, I realize that it would be a matter for congratulation, Mrs. De
Castro. I hope if they do come to terms, your brothers will find Mr.
MacBirney's Western acquaintance and experience of some value. I am
sorry you haven't seen more of my husband----"
"I understand perfectly how engaged he has been."
"He is an unceasing worker. I told him yesterday, when he was leaving
home, that Mrs. De Castro would think I had no husband."
"Then," continued Dolly, pursuing her topic, "if you can secure the
little Cedar Lodge estate on the west shore--and I think it can be
arranged--you will be very comfortable."
Dolly had suggested a drive around the lake, and as she made an
admirable guide Alice looked forward with interest to the trip. If it
should be objected that Dolly was not a good conversationalist, it could
be maintained that she was a fascinating talker.
It is true that people who talk well must, as a penalty, say things.
They can have no continued mental reserves, they must unburden their
inner selves. They let you at once into the heart of affairs about
them--it is the price that the brilliant talker must pay. Such a one
gives you for the moment her plenary confidence, and before Alice had
known Dolly a month, she felt as if she had known her for years.
On their drive the orders were to follow the private roads, and as the
villas around the entire lake connected with one another, they were
obliged to use the high-roads but little. Each of the places had a
story, and none of these lost anything in Dolly's dramatic rendering.
From the lower end of the lake they drove to Sunbury, the
village--commonplace, but Colonial, Dolly explained--and through it.
Taking the ridge road back of the hills, they approached another group
of the country places. The houses of these estates belonged to an older
day than those of the lake itself. Their type indicated the descent
from the earlier simplicity of the Colonial, and afforded a melancholy
reminder of the architectural experiments following the period of the
Civil War.
"Our families have been coming out here for a hundred years," observed
Dolly. "These dreadful French roofs we have been passing, give you the
latest dates on this side of the ridge." As she spoke they approached a
house of brown sandstone set in an ellipse of heavy spruces.
"This was the Roger Morgan place. Mrs. Morgan, Bertha, was our
half-sister, dear, the only child of my father's first marriage--she
died seven years ago. This villa belongs to Fritzie Venable. She was
Roger Morgan's niece. But she hasn't opened it for years--she just
keeps a caretaker here and makes her home with Imogene. To me, spruces
are depressing."
"And what is that?" asked Alice, indicating an ivy-covered pile of stone
in the midst of a cluster of elms at some distance to the left of the
house and on a hill above it. "How odd and pretty!"
"That is the Morgan chapel."
"Oh, may we see it?"
"Of course," assented Dolly, less enthusiastically. "Do you really want
to see it?"
It was Alice's turn to be interested: "Why, yes, if we may. How
quaint-looking," she pursued, scrutinizing the facade.
"It is, in fact, a mediaeval style," said Dolly.
The car was turned into the driveway leading up to the chapel. When the
two women had alighted and walked up the steps to the porch, Alice found
the building larger than it had appeared from below the Morgan house.
Dolly led the way within. "It really is a beautiful thing," she sighed
as they entered. "A reproduction in part--this interior--of a little
church in Rome, that Mrs. Morgan was crazy about, Santa Maria in--dear
me, I never can remember, Santa Maria in something or other. But I want
you to look at this balustrade, and to walk up into one of these
ambones. Can't you see some dark-faced Savonarola preaching from one on
the sins of society?" Dolly ascended the steps of one ambone as she
spoke, while Alice walked up into the other.
"You look as if you might do very well there yourself on that topic,"
suggested Alice.
"But I don't have to get into an ambone to preach. I do well anywhere,
as long as I have an audience," continued Dolly as she swept the modest
nave with a confident glance.
They walked back toward the door: "Here's a perfect light on the chancel
window," said Dolly pausing. "Superb coloring, I think."
Alice, held by the soft rich flame of the glass, halted a moment, and
saw in a niche removed from casual sight the bronze figure of a knight
standing above a pavement tomb. "Is this a memorial?"
"Poor Bertha," continued Dolly; "ordered most of these windows herself."
"But this bronze, Mrs. De Castro, what is it?"
"A memorial of a son of Bertha's, dear."
The shield of the belted figure bore the Morgan arms. An inscription
set in the tomb at his feet took Alice's attention, and Dolly without
joining her waited upon her interest.
"And in whose memory do you say this is?" persisted Alice.
"In memory of one of Bertha's sons, dear."
"Is he buried here?"
"No, he lies in Kimberly Acre, the family burial-ground on The Towers
estate--where we shall all with our troubles one day lie. This poor boy
committed suicide."
"How dreadful!"
"It is too sad a story to tell."
"Of course."
"And I am morbidly sensitive about suicide."
"These Morgans then were relatives of the Mrs. Morgan I met last night?"
"Relatives, yes. But in this instance, that signifies nothing. These,
as I told you, were Fritzie's people and are _very_ different."
They reentered the car and drove rapidly down the ridge. In the
distance, to the south and east, the red gables of a cluster of
buildings showed far away among green, wooded hills.
"That is a school, is it?" asked Alice.
"No, it is a Catholic institution. It is a school, in a way, too, but
not of the kind you mean--something of a charitable and training school.
The Catholic church of the village stands just beyond there. There are
a number of Catholics over toward the seashore--delightful people. We
have none in our set."
The ridge road led them far into the country and they drove rapidly
along ribboned highways until a great hill confronted them and they
began to wind around its base toward the lake and home. Half-way up they
left the main road, turned into an open gateway, and passing a lodge
entered the heavy woods of The Towers villa.
"The Towers is really our only show-place," explained Dolly, "though
Robert, I think, neglects it. Of course, it is a place that stands hard
treatment. But think of the opportunities on these beautiful slopes for
landscape gardening."
"It is very large."
"About two thousand acres. Robert, I fancy, cares for the trees more
than anything else."
"And he lives here alone?"
"With Uncle John Kimberly. Uncle John is all alone in the world, and a
paralytic."
"How unfortunate!"
"Yes. It is unfortunate in some ways; in others not so much so. Don't
be shocked. Ours is so big a family we have many kinds. Uncle John!
mercy! he led his poor Lydia a life. And she was a saint if ever a wife
was one. I hope she has gone to her reward. She never saw through all
the weary years, never knew, _outwardly_, anything of his wickedness."
Dolly looked ahead. "There is the house. See, up through the trees? We
shall get a fine view in a minute. I don't know why it has to be, but
each generation of our family has had a brainy Kimberly and a wicked
Kimberly. The legend is, that when they meet in one, the Kimberlys will
end."