have a family, and I don’t want another house.” She was strongly inclined to decline the offer, but she also knew the truth of what he said. She and Josiah still needed a house, but had done nothing about it since Josiah wasn’t ready to have children, and all she would ever see in that house were the visions of her parents and brother, all gone now. Even if they filled it with children, it would never fully balance the sadness she felt there, and the memories of those she’d lost.
She talked about it with Hortie, who was pregnant with her third child and sick again. She complained that James had turned her into a baby factory, but her own problems seemed minimal now compared to Annabelle’s, and she tried to advise her as sensibly as she could. She thought Josiah was right, and that he and Annabelle should sell the Worthington mansion, and buy a new house for themselves, that had no bad memories for her, or sad ones.
It broke Annabelle’s heart to do it, but within two weeks she agreed. She couldn’t even imagine giving up the house where she had been so happy as a child, but now it was filled with loss and grief. Josiah promised to handle everything for her, and assured her that they would find a new one, or even build one, which would be a happy project for them. And whatever issues they had between them had gone unaddressed during her period of mourning. She was no longer worried about the family they hadn’t started yet. She was in no mood to think of anything but her grief.
She spent all of April packing up the house, and sending everything to storage. And whatever was of no interest or value to her went to auction to be sold. The servants, Josiah, and Henry were tireless in their efforts to help her, and she spent hours crying every day. She hadn’t been to Ellis Island since her mother’s death. She missed it terribly but was too busy now closing her parents’ house. The last of it went to storage in May, the anniversary of the day she and Josiah had gotten engaged two years before. She was relinquishing the house in June, and going to stay at the cottage in Newport, which she insisted she would keep. She and Josiah were going to spend the summer there.
Six days after she closed the house in New York, the Germans sank the
She spent the rest of May in Josiah’s apartment before she left for Newport in June. She took Blanche and those of her mother’s servants who still remained to Newport with her. At the end of the summer, most of them would be moving on to other jobs, and life as she had known it would be forever changed. Blanche and William the butler would be staying in Newport with a few of the others.
Josiah had promised to come to Newport in mid-June, he was planning to take a longer vacation than usual that year, as he knew that Annabelle needed him with her. She looked heartbroken when she left town. The city home she had loved so much was already in other hands.
Once in Newport, Annabelle spent some time with Hortie, who had come up early with her children, their nanny, and her mother. Although only six months pregnant, she was huge again, and Annabelle was too restless to spend much time with her. She had felt sad and anxious since her mother’s death, and it was hard being in Newport without her. In some ways, it felt to her like a replay of the summer after the
They would be staying at her mother’s house and not Josiah’s, and living in Annabelle’s girlhood room. They went on long quiet walks near the sea. He was almost as pensive and silent as she was, but she didn’t press him about it. He got that way sometimes, moody and even despondent. Neither of them was in great spirits. She asked him when Henry was coming up to see them, hoping it would cheer him, and he was vague about it and said he wasn’t sure.
Josiah had been there for nearly a week when he finally turned to her one night as they sat by the fire and said he had to talk to her. She smiled, wondering what he was about to say. Most of the time now they talked about the war. But this time he sighed deeply, and she saw that there were tears in his eyes when he turned toward her.
“Are you all right?” she asked, looking suddenly worried, and all he did was shake his head slowly, and her heart sank like a stone at his words.
“No, I’m not.”
Chapter 11
Nothing in Annabelle’s life prepared her for what Josiah had to say. The impact of his words on her was as powerful as the morning she had seen the headlines about the
“What’s wrong?” she asked him kindly. She couldn’t imagine a problem that would reduce him to the despair she was seeing. He looked devastated. He took a breath then, and began.
“I don’t know how to say this to you, Annabelle,” he said, squeezing her hand. He knew how innocent she still was, and how hard this would be for her to understand. He had wanted to say it to her six months before but thought it would be best to wait until after the holidays, and then her mother had gotten so sick. And he couldn’t tell her after Consuelo died. Annabelle had been too devastated by her mother’s death to sustain yet another blow, and worse yet at his hands. It had been almost six months since Consuelo’s death, and selling the house had been a shock as well. But he just couldn’t wait any longer. She had to know. He couldn’t live a charade anymore, it was driving him insane.
“I don’t understand what’s wrong,” she said, tears filling her eyes now too, before she even knew. “Have I done something to upset you?” He shook his head vehemently.
“Of course not. You’ve been nothing but wonderful to me. You’re a perfect, devoted wife. It’s not you who’s done something wrong, Annabelle, it’s me…right from the beginning. I truly thought I could be a good husband to you, that I could give you a good life. I wanted to-” He started to say more, but she instantly cut him off, hoping to stem the tide. But it was a tidal wave now, which even he couldn’t stop. It had to be faced.
“But you are a good husband, and you do give me a good life.” There was the sound of pleading in her voice, which broke his heart to hear.
“No, I don’t. You deserve so much more. So much more than I can give you. I thought I could, I was certain of it at first, or I would never have done this to you. But I can’t. You deserve a man who can give you everything you want, all your heart’s desires, and who can give you children.”
“We’re in no hurry, Josiah. You always say that we have time.”
“No, we don’t,” he said, looking resolute, his mouth hardening into a firm line. This was much harder to do than he had feared. The worst part of it was that he loved her, but knew he had no right to that now, he never did. And he felt guilty too for breaking his promise to her mother to take care of her, but the situation was far more complicated than Consuelo could have imagined. “We’ve been married for almost two years. I’ve never made love to you. I’ve given you a thousand excuses and fobbed you off.” She had wondered once or twice before if he had a physical problem he’d been too embarrassed to tell her about. But she had always had the feeling that it was emotional and a matter of adjustment, which she hoped he would resolve over time, and never had. They both knew that after nearly two years of marriage, she was still a virgin. She had never admitted it to anyone, not even Hortie or her mother. She had been too ashamed, and feared it was because of something she was doing wrong, or that Josiah didn’t find her attractive. She had tried everything imaginable, from new hairdos to different clothes, and ever more seductive nightgowns, until she’d finally given up on those as well, and decided that he was anxious and it would happen when it was meant to, and he was ready. But she had worried about it a great deal, although she tried to make light of it now to him. “I truly thought when I married you, that I was capable of being a man to you. I’m not. Every time I thought about it, I knew it was wrong, and I could not trade your virtue for a lie.”
