A Good Woman

Chapter 12

Annabelle saw no one after Josiah left. Blanche knew something terrible had happened, but she didn’t dare ask what. Annabelle stayed in her room, and took meals on a tray, which she hardly touched. Once a day, she went out for a walk along the sea, but she saw no one and spoke to nobody. Hortie came by one afternoon, and Annabelle refused to see her. She had Blanche tell her that she was ill. Annabelle was too heartbroken to see even her best friend, and too ashamed to tell her she was getting divorced, even if through no fault of her own, and she couldn’t tell her why. The truth was unthinkable and she wanted to protect Josiah. She panicked every time she thought of never seeing him again.

She knew that once people heard of the divorce, no one would believe her, and that everyone in New York and Newport would be shocked. She wondered how long it would take for news of it to get around. In mourning for her mother, she wasn’t expected to go out, but people would find it strange that they never saw Josiah. Blanche already suspected what had happened, although she thought it was a lovers’ quarrel, and had no idea it would end in divorce. She and the butler whispered that he must be having an affair, but no one could possibly have suspected it was with Henry, or that his and Annabelle’s marriage was over. Blanche tried to tell her that everything would be all right, and all Annabelle could do was cry and shake her head. Nothing would ever be all right again.

Josiah’s attorney came up to see her in July. Josiah had resigned his position at the bank and left for Mexico by then. Two weeks before, Henry had claimed illness in his family and resigned as well. It had never occurred to anyone to link the two events, but the departures of both men were a loss to the bank.

Josiah had sent her a letter before he left, apologizing to her again for his terrible perfidy and betrayal. He said he would bear the guilt of it all his life, and assured her that his love for her had been sincere. The divorce had already been filed in New York, and the attorney brought her a copy of the papers. The only grounds that he had been able to file them under was infidelity, which rocked her to the core when she read it. She had known it, but seeing it was worse. She had told Josiah she wouldn’t file a divorce, so Josiah had no choice but to do it himself.

“Everyone will think I cheated on him,” she said with an anguished look at the attorney, and he shook his head. She had hoped Josiah wouldn’t file it, but he had, on the only grounds that existed.

“No one will ever see these papers,” the attorney assured her. “There was no other choice, since you wouldn’t agree to file a divorce.” She would have died first. She loved him.

As it turned out, Josiah and his attorney’s confidence in the system was gravely misplaced. A clerk at the court sold a copy of the divorce papers to the newspapers, and in August it was published that Josiah had filed for divorce for adultery. In a single stroke, Annabelle’s life and reputation were ruined. Overnight, she became a pariah.

She was still in Newport when she heard of it from her father’s bank, and news of it spread like wildfire. Everyone in Newport was talking about Josiah and Annabelle’s divorce. It took her a full two weeks to have the courage to visit Hortie to talk to her about it, and when she did, she was in for another shock. Instead of allowing her to run straight upstairs to Hortie’s room, where she was languishing on her bed as usual, the butler ushered her into the drawing room, as Hortie’s mother swept out of the room and brushed past her with a disapproving scowl. She said not a word to Annabelle, and it was another ten minutes before Hortie appeared, looking considerably larger than the last time Annabelle had seen her. She looked extremely nervous and didn’t sit down. Instead, she stood looking at Annabelle uncomfortably as tears rushed to Annabelle’s eyes, and Hortie turned away and pretended not to see it.

“I suppose you’ve heard the news. Everybody has,” Annabelle said miserably, and blew her nose discreetly on a lace handkerchief that had been her mother’s. She was carrying her parasol too, as she had walked over from the house on an unusually hot day.

“I had no idea that there was someone else,” Hortie said in a choked voice, and she made no move toward her friend, nor said anything to comfort her. She stood like a statue across the room from Annabelle, her arms firmly at her sides.

“There isn’t, and never was,” Annabelle said clearly. “Adultery was the only grounds they allowed. Josiah wanted the divorce, I didn’t. He thought it was best… he couldn’t… he didn’t want…” Her words trailed into a choked sob. She had no idea how to explain it, because none of what had really happened made sense, and she couldn’t say it, even to her best friend. She didn’t want to betray him, no matter how great his betrayal of her had been. She couldn’t do that to him. He would be ruined forever if she said he had left her for a man, and she didn’t have the courage to tell Hortie she was still a virgin, so she just sat in the chair and cried. And there was no way she could tell her of his shocking illness. “I don’t know what to do,” Annabelle said miserably. “I want to die.” Hortie mistook her agony for guilt. Her mother had said that she deserved everything Josiah did to her now, that a man of Josiah’s moral stature would never divorce a woman for no reason, and that Hortie could rest assured that whatever Annabelle had done had been unforgivable. Otherwise he’d have stayed married to her. And if he had divorced her as an adulteress, then she was. She said she felt extremely sorry for Josiah, and not at all for Annabelle, who got just what she deserved. And James had told Hortie in no uncertain terms that she was strictly forbidden to ever see Annabelle again. He didn’t want her evil influence on his wife.

“I’m very sorry this happened,” Hortie said uncomfortably. “You must have made a terrible mistake.” She tried to be charitable with her, but she actually thought her mother was right. Josiah was too kind a man to do this lightly. For him to divorce Annabelle, quit his job, and leave town, she must have behaved abominably. She had never thought Annabelle capable of it before, but it only proved that you never knew even your best friends. She was severely disappointed in her, and from the flood of tears Annabelle was shedding, she could see just how guilty she felt. Her mother and James were right.

“I didn’t make a mistake,” Annabelle hiccuped as she sobbed. She looked and felt like an abandoned child, and she was shocked that Hortie wasn’t being nicer, after all they’d been through together since they were children. Hortie was looking very distant and sounding very cold.

“I don’t think I want to know what happened,” Hortie said, reaching for the door. “I’m sorry, but you’ll have to go. James said I can’t see you again. Good-bye, Annabelle, I have to go upstairs and lie down, I’m not feeling well.” And with that, she walked out of the room and closed the door behind her, without another word. Annabelle sat staring after her, unable to believe what had just happened. She was shaking violently when she stood up, ran out of the house, and all the way home. She thought of throwing herself into the sea and killing herself, but she didn’t have the courage to do it. She would have liked to, because then she would see her parents and Robert again, she was sure of it. She couldn’t believe that Hortie had abandoned her too, and said she would never see her again. And then she realized that everyone she knew would do the same. Every door in Newport and New York would be closed in her face, once she could go out again.

Annabelle slammed the door behind her as she ran into her own house and up the stairs to her room. She threw herself on the bed, too shocked to even cry. She was still lying there when Blanche let herself into the room and spoke softly to the woman she had known as a child.

“I know you didn’t do what they say, Miss Annabelle. I’ve seen you almost every day, all your life. I know you were a good wife to him. I don’t know what happened between you two, but I know it has nothing to do with you.” And with that, she moved forward and put her arms around Annabelle and they cried together. Annabelle couldn’t tell her what had really caused the divorce, but at least Blanche knew she wasn’t capable of what she was accused of. And as they cried and hugged, Annabelle missed her mother more than ever. She couldn’t even imagine what her life would be like now. She had refused to divorce him, and thinking he was saving her from a worse fate, he had branded her as an adulteress forever.

She got a taste of what it meant in the last weeks of August, as the summer season drew to a close. She went to the store a few times, and the post office, and each time she did, the people she saw on the way turned away and refused to speak to her. Men glared at her in disapproval, and women looked right through her. She had in fact become the pariah she had warned Josiah she would be. He had thought this would be best for her, and had freed her out of love and remorse, and in so doing he had condemned her to a life sentence of disapproval and contempt. She had been banished by her own from her own world. She knew then that her life was over in Newport and New York, and she would never again be admitted into proper homes, or into polite circles. She would forever be the adulteress whom Josiah Millbank had divorced. He might as well have taken her out and hanged her. The decent woman she had always been was as good as dead.