Chapter 10: Eleanor's Birthday

Eleanor turned seventy-four at a table of forty, under crystal chandeliers, with a string quartet in the corner.

I sat at her right hand in a dark green dress.

Camille sat at her left, in white, being adored.

Talbot's mother sat four seats down, in lavender, with a face like paper.

Nobody had told her that she was not welcome.

The Trezevants had known the Berriens for thirty years, and Eleanor liked to watch her enemies eat.

Rhona sat across from Nathan with a red scarf on, whispering jokes about the soup.

Behind a pillar near the kitchen door sat the lab clerk, in the only suit he owned.

He held a glass of water on his knee.

He had agreed to come, and he looked ready to vomit.

The quartet finished a waltz.

Eleanor lifted her glass.

"I want to thank you all for being here," she said. "I am not a sentimental woman."

"I will say only that this has been the strangest month of my life."

Polite laughter.

"This month I found my son's daughter."

Forty faces swung toward me.

I felt it like a hand on my back.

"Sophia," Eleanor said, and her voice shook. "Welcome home."

The room applauded.

Camille clapped too, with her teeth showing, and when the noise died down she leaned over and kissed Eleanor's cheek.

"I'm so happy for her, Grandmother," she said. "I've been saying all along that she and I are family."

"Camille," I said pleasantly. "I want to play something for the table."

She went still.

"Now?" she said. "It's Grandmother's birthday."

"I know. I think she'll want to hear it."

Nathan had run a cable under the table that afternoon.

He pressed a button on his phone, and the dining room's speakers came alive.

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