Heart of Glass Read Online Free PDF Page A

Hedgerows were altogether missing in places. The roses Colin’s mother once prized were in dire need of pruning, struggling valiantly against the weeds.
    Kate focused on the back of the main house. Many of the lacquered window shutters were missing. Bits of peeling paint clung to those that remained. Two of the back steps had rotted away.
    As they passed the kitchen, an outbuilding close to the main structure, Kate saw someone through the window. Since her last visit a few months ago, a vegetable garden had been planted behind the kitchen and another near the first dwelling in a row of former slave cabins.
    Kate knocked on the kitchen door and, to her delight, a former slave named Eugenie, who had been the Delanys’ cook before the war, answered.
    “My stars if it ain’t little Katie Keene.” The tall, slender woman in her early fifties was all smiles.
    “I go by Kate now.” She indicated her companion. “You remember Myra O’Hara?”
    “Your nanny? Why, sure I ‘member her. Welcome, Miss Myra.” Eugenie ushered them both inside the kitchen and her expression darkened. “You seen Mr. Colin yet?”
    Kate nodded. “Just now, unfortunately. I wish I could say he was even half as happy to see me as you are.”
    Eugenie shook her head. Worry emphasized lines the years had added to her thin face. She crossed her long arms at her waist. “I can’t believe you even got past the door. He’s not himself anymore, that’s for certain.”
    Myra sniffed.
    Kate tried to replace the image of Colin now with the memory she’d carried in her heart for so long. She imagined him in the doorway of the
garçonnière
, smiling down at her, handing her a rose. Surely that Colin was still inside him somewhere.
    Eugenie interrupted her thoughts.
    “Come have a seat, ladies.”
    Kate took in the huge hearth and fireplace, the battered and blackened pots and pans hanging from hooks along the mantle. A tea kettle was steaming on the stove in the corner. Eugenie was waving them over to the table and chairs in the center of the room.
    “You two sit and I’ll fix you up with some hot chicory and biscuits. Sorry I don’t have any coffee. We been makin’ due with chicory since the war.”
    As Eugenie puttered, Kate quickly explained that, having seen Colin, she had decided to stay to help him. Taking in the bare kitchen shelves she was glad she’d come.
    “You’re the answer to my prayers, Miss Kate. Since Mr. Colin got back he seems to be gettin’ worse instead of better. There’s nobody livin’ in the house. No reason you can’t stay on for a while,” Eugenie said. “The place is in need of a good cleaning. Ain’t much in there from the old days, but Simon and I can fix up pallets foryou and Miss Myra. Havin’ you here might do Mr. Colin a world of good.”
    After what just happened? Kate doubted it.
    “I heard your daddy died and Captain’s Landin’ got sold a while back. You been living in New Orleans all this time, Miss Kate?”
    “Papa sent me away with Myra when the war started. We lived in Boston and then Ireland and didn’t come back until just before Father died four years ago. Mother sold the plantation and went off to Europe. Myra and I had been living in her townhouse, but a few weeks ago she sent word she married an Italian count and wanted the townhouse sold. So we’ve been living in a suite at the St. Charles Hotel.”
    It was like Nola Keene to simply send a letter and expect things to get done. The woman had had a battery of accountants, lawyers, and slaves to do her bidding most of her life. Kate had never been close enough to Nola to have to dance to her tune very often. That lack of love was something she didn’t like to ponder.
    “I’ve come out here a few times over the years and have never seen any signs of life before,” Kate said.
    “My husband, Simon, and I only been back ‘bout three months now. Soon as the war ended we took off. We traveled ‘round lookin’ for work and tried to find