“I know you’re right. I just—poor Mother. She has lost so much.”
“She has. But she still has a lot.” Robert pulled her in toward him and gave her a gentle peck on the cheek. “She has us. And, you might not have noticed, but she seemed thrilled to be able to relocate to Palm Beach.”
“You’re right, I suppose.” Ruth smiled softly. “She was always much happier there than Father was.”
“Yet another reason why I don’t understand the board seat. It isn’t as if she will be here to attend meetings.”
“No, she won’t. She will likely vote in absentia. Or appoint someone proxy. She has made it quite clear that her preference is to remain in Florida most of the year.”
“Exactly, I’m not sure why she is even keeping the Gramercy Park house. Perhaps we should see about moving there ourselves?” His eyes lit up slightly.
“Robert, it was their family home. I don’t want to live there! We have more than enough space in our townhouse. And that is actually ours.”
“Of course, darling. I love our townhouse, you know that. I was just thinking, if we lived in the mansion, I could convert a portion of it into an office for my private patients. It would be an efficient way to be near to home and manage all my work at the hospital and privately.”
Ruth stopped walking and looked at Robert for a moment. The idea of his having an office at home for his outpatient psychiatry practice was intriguing. But she decidedly did not want to live in her parents’ mansion, a place that had never felt much like a home to her to begin with.
“I think it would be too much for Mother not to have Gramercy Park waiting for her when she returns on visits. And, with the demands on all of us now that the war is escalating”—she took a sad, deep breath—“I don’t think there is any reason to make any changes. Anyway, if I were to move anywhere, it would be Magnolia Bluff.”
“Now there’s an idea! Why, I could convert the carriage house into a whole office suite!” Robert smiled as they began walking again. “And you are so happy there. You need a place that calms your nerves with the hospital being what it is these days—all the soldiers. I know it is hard on you.” He squeezed her hand tightly; he didn’t ever mention Harry directly, but she appreciated this subtle acknowledgment of her lingering pain. “I think a move to the beach might be really extraordinary for us.”
Ruth pondered the idea. Magnolia Bluff was the place where she was most at peace in the world. And with her father gone and the war raging, her emotions were ragged. At Magnolia Bluff, she could take solace in the happiest times of her life: the carefree days with Harry, the quiet weekends with Robert. It could be a wonderful salve to the pain she witnessed at the hospital.
“I say we do it!” She smiled and turned back to Robert, momentarily gleeful. “Of course, there will be times where work makes it impossible to commute—but we will have the townhouse for that. I love the idea. A peaceful retreat at the end of each day at Magnolia Bluff. Robert, yet again, your brilliance amazes me. Thank you.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Goddamnit! Goddamn them! Look what they’ve done to him. We have to help!” Estelle Lennox stood in Ruth’s office yelling and waving her arms to flag down imaginary aid for an imaginary patient.
“She’s been like this for months,” her father said quietly as he sat in the chair beside her, the eggplant-colored circles under his eyes revealing the toll his daughter’s behavior had taken. “I thought she’d improve when the navy discharged her, when she was no longer taking care of all these wounded soldiers. But it’s been two months and she’s gotten so much worse. Sometimes I even wonder if she’ll hurt someone—me, or herself.” He placed his face in his hands and took a deep breath. “I’m a widower, Mrs. Apter, and I need to work. I just don’t know how to take care of her on my own.”