She smiled back. “Could I see the ponies?” she asked me, surprising me with the clear blue sound of her voice. She looked like a young woman, but at sixteen, she was very much a child still, a little girl excited at the idea of seeing a pony.
The ponies. Tom’s goddamned ponies. There was a stable where he kept them, back across the yard, halfway to the lake. I knew it was there, I’d seen it from a distance, and yet I’d refused to step foot inside since we’d moved here.
“Oh, Rebecca, mind your manners.” Josephina let out a nervous titter, waving away the request in a way that reminded me a little of Mother, always telling me to be a lady. Rebecca cast her eyes down, back to her plate.
The rain had stopped and the air from the open door wafted in, heavy and humid and filled with the sounds of crickets preening in the distance. If Rebecca went to see the ponies, then this awful dinner could be over and I could go upstairs and still read Pammy a story before she fell asleep. Then I could get into bed myself. Exhaustion had settled over me, somewhere between the talk of Josephina’s peonies and the azaleas. I was so very tired now, I wondered if I might sleep all through the night, for the first time since we’d come to Lake Forest.
“Tom,” I said his name loudly enough that he stopped his conversation with Harold, midsentence. “Rebecca wants to see your ponies, darling.”
Tom made a face; I couldn’t quite tell if it was disdain or amusement from so far away down the table. He finished off his whiskey and stood, slapping his hands on the table. “All right then, let’s all go see the ponies. Harold, Josephina, will you join us? Daisy?” Now he was smirking, like he was thrilled by the prospect of trapping me into finally going out to his stables, and even more thrilled that I’d brought it upon myself by interrupting his conversation.
Josephina glanced at me, as if for permission. “I’m going to excuse myself to go put the baby to bed,” I said. “But you all go on ahead without me.”
“The nurse will put the baby to bed,” Tom said, quickly.
“Pammy likes it when I do it,” I said. Josephina nodded, cast me a knowing smile. Tom frowned deeply—he hated it when I chose Pammy over him, always reminding me that we had staff to look after her, to care for her every need. He didn’t understand the way that holding her, reading her a story, kissing her good night each night, feeling her soft skin and smelling her baby girl powder smell quieted the restlessness inside of me for the smallest of moments. Sometimes it felt like I needed Pammy more than she needed me. “Anyway”—I stood—“it was so nice to meet you, Buckleys. I hope I’ll see you again soon.”
I could feel Tom’s disapproving eyes on me as I stood and walked away. And later, when I awoke restless again, at midnight, he wasn’t in bed.
* * *
WE WOULD NOT see the Buckleys again soon, thank goodness. Or at least, I wouldn’t.
Tom played polo with Harold still, but in the months that ensued, we looked elsewhere for social engagements. We began going into the city for parties at least once a week, and there we found a younger crowd, a wealthy crowd—friends Tom had known from Yale or boarding school who’d moved back. But still, they were Tom’s friends. They had wives, and they had girlfriends, but I wouldn’t say I really became friends with anyone on my own right in Chicago. There were other women I talked to at parties—we compared diamonds and pearls, and stories about baby nurses. And one time in September we were at a soiree so gay, we ended up all taking our clothes off and diving into the cool waters of Lake Michigan sometime just before dawn. Tom lifted me up in the water, and I was laughing, and the world felt all at once bright and surreal. But he was so drunk that night that back at home, he slept for two days straight and still had a hangover and a frown on his face the following Sunday.
Still, I lived for those parties. Dressing up and going into the city on Tom’s arm. Lake Forest was too quiet. We were far enough from the city that I only went in for a specific engagement. At least in Cannes, I had the beach to while away my days. Here it became almost too unbearably cold to spend much time outside, even by the end of September.
Tom played polo most days, and I was left behind at home with only the staff and Pammy. Sometimes I wondered if everything might be better if I took Pammy’s care all onto myself. She would keep me endlessly busy, and being with Pammy always made me feel happy in a way nothing else did. But when I mentioned it to Tom, he said he wouldn’t hear of his wife being a nursemaid.