Forever, For Love Read online

  Abruptly, Ward slammed the ledger shut and stood up. He wandered back to the window that overlooked the storm-tossed beach. There seemed no logical explanation for his black mood, and no help for it.

  Perhaps he’d been too long without a woman. For a moment he thought of paying a visit to Abbie Allen’s sporting house on Postoffice Street. Abbie’s girls were always happy to see him and more than willing to provide him with an hour’s entertainment. He flopped back down in his deep leather chair with a weary sigh. No, that wasn’t the answer.

  Without giving any thought to what he was doing, he reached for Pandora’s box and opened it, fingering the objects inside, wondering who had put them there and what mysteries lay locked in their past.

  A few blocks away, the Sherwood mansion glowed that night, and all up and down Broadway the sweet strains of a string quartet filled the warm night air. Carriages arrived in an endless flow of polished wood and gilt trim, their smartly groomed teams prancing in high spirits that befit the occasion.

  Pandora’s engagement to Jacob Saenger was an ill-kept secret thanks to her aunt and uncle, Tabitha and Horace Sherwood. The crème de la crème of Galveston society arrived, glittering with their best jewels and twittering with the juiciest gossip of the year. It wasn’t every day that the only son of a middle-class German family managed a match with a beautiful heiress. Nor did it often happen that a strange, wild girl like Pandora Sherwood was able to find a respectable man to marry—fortune or no fortune!

  Old Proteus, the Sherwoods’ butler, heard it all as he helped the gusts down from their carriages, then led them along the full length of red carpet, rolled out from the front door of the Italianate mansion to the road to protect the ladies’ gowns.

  “My dear,” Mrs. Landes whispered to Mrs. Rosenberg, “I never thought she’d marry. Such an eccentric girl! Lovely, but so different.”

  “Different matters not at all, my friend, when there’s a fortune involved. You know her father was in railroads and left her everything. Jacob Saenger will never have to tend another patient once they’re husband and wife. He’ll be moving up in the world, no doubt about it.”

  “Do you suppose they’ll dare have a family? After all, the children might turn out as odd as she.”

  “Ladies, ladies, please!” Mr. Landes interrupted with a reproving glance at his wife. “No more of this. They’ll hear you. Jacob’s a fine young man and Pandora will make him a lovely, sweet wife. Let’s leave it at that, shall we?”

  The women fell silent, but exchanged meaningful looks. Both of them had sons who had proposed to Pandora Sherwood. Both mothers had held out high hopes. But both sons had been summarily dismissed by the flighty young woman. She hadn’t good sense, in their opinion.

  In spite of their bruised egos, the two rejected mothers smiled graciously as they entered the gleaming mansion to greet their hostess, Mrs. Tabitha Sherwood. After all, good manners counted for everything, especially here in cultured Galveston—the New York of the West.

  Pandora paced her room, her panic rising with each passing moment. Aunt Tabitha had demanded that she stay put until the right moment. “Once all the guests have arrived, you’ll make your grand entrance down the stairway, my dear. Oh, I can see it now! Every woman at the party will be green with envy at the first glimpse of that Worth gown. And as for the young men, well, they’ll all be wishing they were in Jacob’s shoes. Everyone who matters in Galveston will realize at last how wrong they’ve been about you. If you are different from their daughters, that difference is definitely to your advantage.”

  With a slightly indignant sniff, Tabitha had left Pandora alone to await her cue.

  Pandora wished her aunt had not made that final remark. She detested being looked upon as different. Granted, she had some strange power that other people did not possess, but did she have to be constantly reminded of it? To cover her “queerness,” as most people referred to her unnatural abilities, she put on an eccentric facade. If they wanted to whisper about her, she would give them plenty of juicy gossip for their rumor mill—her extravagant wardrobe, her unchaperoned trips, her many casual suitors, her shocking paintings, and her seeming disregard for what anyone might say about her. The only problem was she’d been caught up in her own act for so long that now she hardly knew any longer where the pretend Pandora left off and the real Pandora began.

  “What does it matter?” she said with a sudden, angry flutter of her fan. “I am who I am and there is no help for it.”

  She tilted her head to one side and thought about it for a moment, then spoke again to her image in the mirror. “Actually, I like myself quite well, thank you. Never mind what anyone else might think.”

  At least her aunt and uncle accepted her “oddity.” They took great pleasure in having her demonstrate her second sight for their friends as if she were some sideshow entertainer. Her own mother and father, on the other hand, had tried to hide her gifts away, to protect her, they’d always said. She’d even been somewhat isolated from playmates until after her parents’ death. When at age ten, she came to live with her aunt and uncle and her younger cousin, Angelica, in Galveston where she’d been born, everything changed.

  “Eighteen years ago this very night,” Pandora said aloud, staring out the window at the palm fronds tossing in the blustery wind. The feel of an approaching storm sent a shiver through her.

  Her birth had coincided with an awesome West Indian hurricane that struck the island, battering it viciously. Her mother was visiting her in-laws when Pandora chose to arrive ahead of schedule. Lucretia Pennington Sherwood had thought she had plenty of time before she was due. But the storm, old Dr. Saenger said, brought on her labor prematurely. So Pandora had entered this life—scrawny, sickly, and perpetually shrieking—six weeks before her appointed debut.

  Oddly enough, Pandora remembered every detail of the night of her birth. She even remembered the discussion between her mother and old Dr. Saenger, Jacob’s father, only moments after she was born. She recalled her mother’s tearful gratitude and the physician saying in a soothing, teasing tone: “I’ve a fine strong boy for this pretty girl of yours once they’re of an age to wed.” Pandora always figured that it was Dr. Saenger who put the idea in her mother’s head. A good idea, she reminded herself. She was happy to comply with her parents’ wishes in this instance. They hadn’t often agreed on things. Her parents had always dismissed her dreams, her visions, and these memories of her birth, saying that she had only heard them speak so often of that night that it seemed an actual recollection. Still… Pandora wondered. Remembering one’s birth hardly seemed stranger than being able to see into the future. And that she did regularly.

  A sharp rap at the door brought Pandora out of her reverie. “Come in,” she called.

  Angelica stood before her a moment later—a girl of sixteen with long silver-blonde hair and pale blue eyes large, lovely, and mesmerizing. Her cousin’s fragile beauty never failed to shock Pandora. Angelica’s features were finely cast, classically sculpted. And her fair coloring gave her an ethereal look. Pandora liked to think of herself as attractive. But when her younger cousin was near, she realized that her own mouth and eyes were too large, her lips too full, and her nose a fair copy of those patrician ladies in Roman sculptures. As for her coloring, she seemed to have been baptized in a brilliant rainbow. Her hair blazed as red as a sunset over the Gulf. Her green eyes were an odd, light shade that reflected the colors around her. On stormy days they were gray-green, while in bright blue weather they turned turquoise and in full sun they paled to the color of tender spring grass.

  In artists’ terms, Angelica mirrored some pale, cool beauty from Botticelli’s brush, while Pandora saw herself more in the image of Edouard Manet’s much-maligned Olympia. She even shared the nude model’s faithful, dark-skinned servant and her love of cats.

  Pandora smiled at these self-deprecating thoughts. Angelica looked too unhappy to be envied. The girl’s hostility was a palpable fo
rce in the room. Angelica’s jealousy had been clear from the moment Pandora came to live in the Sherwood home. Pandora tried everything, but she could not win her younger cousin’s trust and affection.

  “Angelica, you look gorgeous! That gown is simply perfect for you.”

  The slender blonde tilted her head back at a defiant angle and stared at Pandora, unsmiling. “Well, it isn’t from the House of Worth, but I suppose it will serve well enough for the evening. After all, it’s only a birthday party.”

  Pandora had pleaded with her aunt to order both their gowns from Paris, knowing what Angelica’s reaction would be. But Tabitha had replied, “Go to all that expense for a child? My dear, your tastes are far too extravagant. Besides, you’ll want to outshine Angelica at your party. She’ll look dazzling no matter what she wears. But you must work at it, dear.”

  Pandora avoided her cousin’s accusing gaze and asked, “Is Aunt Tabitha ready for me to come down?”

  Angelica shoved one of Pandora’s six white cats out of the slipper chair and sat down, being careful not to muss the peach lace ruffles of her skirt. “I think this whole business of a grand entrance is silly.”

  “I couldn’t agree more. But you know your mother when she sets her mind to something,” Pandora replied. Then with a twinkle in her eyes, she added, “I’m half-tempted to sneak out the back way and let you come down the stairs while I slip in through the servants’ passage. Wouldn’t that frost the cake?”

  Angelica stared in silence at her cousin. Finally, she said, “I can’t believe you really intend to marry Jacob.”

  Pandora turned back from the window in surprise. “Angelica, what are you saying? Everyone has known for years that Jacob and I would marry eventually. You know it’s what my parents wanted for me. Why, I’ve never given any other man a serious thought. Of course, it won’t be right away. Jacob has to establish his practice here in Galveston and I still plan to go to Europe to continue my art studies for a few months. And I’ll buy my trousseau while I’m in Paris. When I return, we’ll both be ready.”

  “And where will you live?” Angelica persisted. “In his father’s old house over on Avenue O? That will be quite a comedown for you after having been raised in a mansion on Broadway. Honestly, Pandora, I don’t see how you can even consider it.”

  Pandora laughed. “Angelica, when you care for a person enough to marry, it doesn’t matter where you live. You’re young yet…”

  Her voice trailed off as a strange dizziness descended over her. An instant later, Pandora seemed to be far away, in a strange time and place. She tried to come back, but she seemed trapped. She heard herself saying the same words she had just spoken to Angelica: “It matters little where I live as long as I’m with the man I love. I know it’s hard for you to understand. You’re young yet, Isabel.”

  Gone was Pandora’s gown from Worth, replaced by a long, full skirt of scarlet and a loose-fitting peasant blouse. Her only bit of finery was a pair of golden earrings set with brilliantly sparkling stones. The girl with her was dressed in similar fashion. Pandora’s feet were bare, the sand warm beneath them. The brisk Gulf breeze whipped her long, ebony hair. She was holding a baby in her arms, her own child she was sure, although she had no idea how she knew that or who the father might be. But, obviously, the black-haired woman loved him very much.

  They were standing on a sandy path that wound through a jumbled maze of huts and hovels. The sun was beating down on them. The girl with her was tall and slender, not blonde like Angelica, but dark of hair and eye. She glanced beyond the village, toward the water. Tall ships lay at anchor—not the steam-driven vessels of Pandora’s day, but sailing schooners, flying the flags of many nations.

  Slowly, the scene began to fade. Pandora blinked rapidly, trying to clear her vision. Angelica still sat pouting before her.

  “You’ll understand when you’re a few years older,” Pandora said gently, willing the dizziness away, “when you fall in love.”

  Angelica—or was it Isabel? The strange girl from her vision was in Pandora’s room now, still dressed in the ragged costume from moments before. Whoever she was, she flounced up from the chair where Angelica had been sitting and turned angrily toward the door.

  “Don’t treat me like a child, madame! I am a woman. You don’t really know anything about me. Perhaps I’m already in love!” Isabel’s angry expression turned to a malicious smile as she added, “Or perhaps you do know that I am in love and that you can do nothing about it.”

  The words stung, causing pain in the deepest part of Pandora’s heart. She tightened her hold on the child as if to protect it from the other woman’s harshness. But her arms closed on empty air. The baby had vanished.

  Pandora put a hand to her forehead and closed her eyes for a moment. All traces of the vision vanished.

  Fighting waves of confusion beyond her understanding, Pandora reached out for the bedpost to steady herself. This was not the first time she had experienced such a vision. But never before had it seemed so real, so threatening. What could it mean?

  She was still struggling to regain her poise when her aunt called from the hallway, “It’s time, Pandora!”

  Taking several deep breaths to steel herself, Pandora started for the door. Jacob would be downstairs waiting. Perhaps what she felt for him was not the giddy sort of love she heard other girls talk about, but she admired and respected her future husband. He was a kind and caring man, a man who would protect her from the harshness of the world. Her parents had chosen well for her. With that thought in mind, she could face any threat—real or imagined.

  Dr. Jacob Saenger felt uncomfortable in his newly acquired evening clothes and out of place among the first families of Galveston. He stood patiently at the base of the tall, curving staircase, waiting for the first glimpse of the woman who would soon be his wife.

  Only for Pandora would I endure this, he thought with a wry smile.

  All around him, the Sherwoods’ guests mingled in their usual cliques. The pecking order never changed. On the surface they put on an appearance of friendliness with one another, but the railroad people stayed with the railroad people while the merchants moved within their own circle. And the elite members of the Galveston Wharf Company—the Octopus of the Gulf—made up a totally private and exclusive group, their conversations centering around shipping, tariffs, and port fees.

  So where in all this did the son of their good German doctor fit? He didn’t! And Jacob Saenger knew it. As a physician, he was little more to them than any other paid servant. But his marriage to Pandora would change all that, elevating his position in society. For her and for what this marriage would mean to him, Jacob could make small talk while he sipped imported champagne instead of the whiskey he favored. He could smile when required, nod at the right moment, and even pretend to be enjoying himself.

  “Jacob, there you are!”

  The familiar chime of a feminine voice made him turn. He smiled genuinely into Angelica’s silvery-blue eyes and let out a sigh of relief. He didn’t have to pretend with Pandora’s young cousin.

  “Ah, it’s an angel of mercy come to rescue me. And not a moment too soon.” Jacob led Angelica away from the crowd, to a relatively quiet corner of the parlor.

  “You aren’t enjoying yourself, Jacob?” Angelica frowned, not at Jacob, for him. He was clearly miserable at the moment.

  “You know me, Angel. I’m not much use at a party.”

  She bestowed a dazzling smile on him and leaned close to whisper, “I like it when you call me that, Jacob. You’re the only one who ever does.”

  He gazed down at his soon-to-be-cousin and smiled warmly. She looked like an angel tonight, all wrapped in peach-colored lace the same shade as the glow of her cheeks. Overnight, it seemed, she was becoming a woman.

  “Ah, I’m a lucky man,” Jacob quipped.

  “Lucky?” Angelica put on a pretty pout, sure that he referred to his coming marriage to Pandora.

>   He laughed at her injured expression. “Yes, you little charmer. Lucky that I’ll be out of harm’s way by the time you’re of courting age.” He waved his arm in an expansive gesture. “I’d be willing to bet that before you settle down, you’ll have broken every heart in Galveston. But I’ll be safely married by then.”

  Angelica lowered her dark gold lashes and gave him a seductive smile. “Stop it, Jacob! You’ll have me blushing soon.”

  He touched her cheek in nothing more than a playful, friendly gesture. “There’s not a lady at this party who can wear a blush so becomingly, Angel.”

  She covered his hand with hers, holding it to her face. “Oh, Jacob…”

  Just then the music swelled and all eyes turned toward the staircase. Without a word, Jacob moved away from Angelica and shouldered his way through the crowd to the foot of the stairs. He held his breath, waiting.

  Suddenly, there she was. To Jacob it seemed that everyone else at the party vanished in an instant. He saw only the statuesque figure poised at the head of the stairs. Pandora had never looked lovelier. Her fiery hair was parted in the middle and drawn back and up in soft waves, ornamented with twists of pearls that ended in a coil atop her head. Her gown of ciel-bleu damask was richly trimmed in embroidered lace. Festoons of pink pearls and glittering crystals trailed down the narrow-waisted skirt, ending where the train swept out to trail majestically behind her.

  She looked like a queen. Jacob had difficulty equating this vision with the down-to-earth woman who would soon be his wife. For an instant, he told himself he was making a terrible mistake. She was too grand to be a mere doctor’s wife. How could he ever live up to such a woman? But he quickly brushed all doubts aside as their eyes met and she smiled. A moment later, she started down to him.

  Pandora was still feeling a bit unsteady after her recent vision, but the second her eyes lit on Jacob, she began to relax. As soon as they were alone, she would tell him what had happened with Angelica. He wouldn’t understand any more than she did, but she could talk to him about these things. He had a way of making her feel better simply by listening.