I glance at the door, praying Stuart will get here soon. This is the second timeshe has come up. Missus Whitworth gives the Senator a deafening look.

“Well, what are we gonna do, Francine? Just never talk about her again? We had the damn gazebo built in the backyard for the wedding.”

Missus Whitworth takes a deep breath and I am reminded of what Stuart said to me, that the Senator only knows part of it, but his mother, she knows all. And what she knows must be much worse than just“ruck-a-muck.”

“Eugenia”—Missus Whitworth smiles—“I understand you aim to be a writer. What kinds of things do you like to write?”

I put my smile back on. From one good subject to the next.“I write the Miss Myrna column in theJackson Journal. It comes out every Monday.”

“Oh, I think Bessie reads that, doesn’t she, Stooley? I’ll have to ask her when I go in the kitchen.”

“Well, if she doesn’t, she sure as hell will now.” The Senator laughs.

“Stuart said you were trying to get into more serious subjects. Anything particular?”

Now everyone is looking at me, including the maid, a different one from the door, as she hands me a glass of tea. I don’t look at her face, terrified of what I’ll see there. “I’m working on a . . . a few—”

“Eugenia is writing about the life of Jesus Christ,” Mother pops in and I recall my most recent lie to cover my nights out, calling it “research.”

“Well,” Missus Whitworth nods, looks impressed by this, “that’s certainly an honorable subject.”

I try to smile, disgusted by my own voice.“And such an . . . Important one.” I glance at Mother. She’s beaming.

The front door slams, sending all the glass lamps into a furious tinkle.

“Sorry I’m so late.” Stuart strides in, wrinkled from the car, pulling on his navy sportscoat. We all stand up and his mother holds out her arms to him but he heads straight for me. He puts his hands on my shoulders and kisses my cheek. “Sorry,” he whispers and I breathe out, finally relax half an inch. I turn and see his mother smiling like I just snatched her best guest towel and wiped my dirty hands all over it.

“Get yourself a drink, son, sit down,” the Senator says. When Stuart has his drink, he settles next to me on the sofa, squeezes my hand and doesn’t let go.

Missus Whitworth gives one glance at our hand-holding and says,“Charlotte, why don’t I give you and Eugenia a tour of the house?”

For the next fifteen minutes, I follow Mother and Missus Whitworth from one ostentatious room to the next. Mother gasps over a genuine Yankee bullethole in the front parlor, the bullet still lodged in the wood. There are letters from Confederate soldiers lying on a Federal desk, strategically placed antique spectacles and handkerchiefs. The house is a shrine to the War Between the States and I wonder what it must’ve been like for Stuart, growing up in a home where you can’t touch anything.

On the third floor, Mother gaggles over a canopy bed where Robert E. Lee slept. When we finally come down a“secret” staircase, I linger over family pictures in the hallway. I see Stuart and his two brothers as babies, Stuart holding a red ball. Stuart in a christening gown, held by a colored woman in white uniform.

Mother and Missus Whitworth move down the hall, but I keep looking, for there is something so deeply dear in Stuart’s face as a young boy. His cheeks were fat and his mother’s blue eyes shone the same as they do now. His hair was the whitish-yellow of a dandelion. At nine or ten, he stands with a hunting rifle and a duck. At fifteen, next to a slain deer. Already he is good-looking, rugged. I pray to God henever sees my teenage pictures.

I walk a few steps and see high school graduation, Stuart proud in a military school uniform. In the center of the wall, there is an empty space without a frame, a rectangle of wallpaper just the slightest shade darker. A picture has been removed.

“Dad, that is enough about—” I hear Stuart say, his voice strained. But just as quickly, there is silence.

“Dinner is served,” I hear a maid announce and I weave my way back into the living room. We all trail into the dining room to a long, dark table. The Phelans are seated on one side, the Whitworths on the other. I am diagonal from Stuart, placed as far as possible from him. Around the room, the wainscoting panels have been painted to depict scenes of pre-Civil War times, happy Negroes picking cotton, horses pulling wagons, white-bearded statesmen on the steps of our capitol. We wait while the Senator lingers in the living room. “I’ll be right there, y’all go ahead and start.” I hear the clink of ice, the clop of the bottle being set down two more times before he finally comes in and sits at the head of the table.

Waldorf salads are served. Stuart looks over at me and smiles every few minutes. Senator Whitworth leans over to Daddy and says,“I came from nothing, you know. Jefferson County, Mississippi. My daddy dried peanuts for eleven cents a pound.”

Daddy shakes his head.“Doesn’t get much poorer than Jefferson County.”

I watch as Mother cuts off the tiniest bite of apple. She hesitates, chews it for the longest time, winces as it goes down. She wouldn’t allow me to tell Stuart’s parents about her stomach problem. Instead, Mother ravishes Missus Whitworth with degustationary compliments. Mother views this supper as an important move in the game called “Can My Daughter Catch Your Son?”

“Theyoung people so enjoy each other’s company.” Mother smiles. “Why, Stuart comes out to see us at the house nearly twice a week.”

“Is that right?” says Missus Whitworth.

“We’d be delighted if you and the Senator could drive out to the plantation for supper sometime, take a walk around the orchard?”