“I’ve just completed the plans and the investments for a new textile factory in Charlottesville. The construction will begin this coming week. To keep the cost under control, we have to meet deadlines. I simply must be here to oversee it all. It could cost me tens of thousands more than it should.”

“How long will it take?”

“Four months,” he said.

“Four months! According to Dr. Ross, I’m well past two. That will be six or so. How can I go on a honeymoon if I look so pregnant?”

“We’ll go where no one sees us or . . .”

“No one sees us? What would that be? A cabin in the woods?”

He laughed. “Okay. We’ll go as soon as you’re able to go after giving birth. How’s that?”

“What will we tell people now when they ask where we’re going?”

“The truth. I’m too busy at the moment, but I couldn’t wait to make you my wife. I was afraid someone else would sweep you off.”

He kissed me and stood back, smiling.

I didn’t smile. The gossips who were coming would have reason to say mean things about me. She married a man like her father and will become her mother.

“Hey, hey, hey. We have a whole life to spend together, Corrine. Let’s not worry about a ten-day holiday. There’ll be plenty of those.”

“Not if you’re anything like my father,” I muttered.

“Oh, I’m not. You can bet Foxworth Hall on it,” he said.

But later, at dinner, his conversation was all about his new textile factory, the markets, both domestic and international, and what he would like to see politically to help build his business. The talk was as boring as my father’s dinner conversation could be. Where were the romantic and dramatic descriptions of faraway places, the awe-inspiring sights he wanted me to see? The only part that seemed at all interesting was his plan for us to go to London, partly, probably mostly, to set up some new markets for his factories and do some sightseeing. But that was at least a year or so off. Finally, seeing how bored I was, he talked about the musicians he had hired to play at our wedding reception.

“We’re paying top dollar for the best.”

After dinner, he went to his office for some “last-minute business details,” and I sat in the living room reading the novel this Claudette had given him. At least, I tried to read it. Every once in a while, I recalled what he had told me about being in love with her for a minute. Visions of him with some French girl kept coming between me and the words. I finally cast it aside, rose, and went to his office. He was scribbling on some chart and didn’t even hear me enter.

“I’m going up to bed,” I said.