the thriving hub of the Northeast, Barrington nested in sloping oaks and bushy maples on hilly roads. From the top of the town square on a clear night you could see Boston’s downtown lights twinkling in the distance. This Sunday the deep green of the trees and the startling white of the houses and the church steeples were sleek with fog and rain. Herman Barrington could’ve built his homestead anywhere, on a thousand acres with a mile-long winding driveway, like his brother Henry, but he chose instead to live four blocks from Main Street, in a stately but traditional colonial estate right off the sidewalk, from which passersby could glance into his bay windows. And when the family and their friends gathered in the drawing room or the library, sipping their drinks, fire crackling, amiably chatting, they could also see all the way down the wet and winding street.
This Sunday afternoon, as every other, Esther Barrington waited with her brother in the library, adjacent to the drawing room. Harry only pretended to wait. He was reading. The fire was on, their drinks were at their sides. She sat in the wingback, staring out the window.
“Is that staring out the window longingly?” asked Harry from the Chesterfield without raising his head. “Waiting for Alice, are we?”
Esther primly folded her arms. “I will not be mocked by you.”
“No?” He smiled.
“Oh, you’re brave now.”
“I’m not that brave.”
“Harry, I need to speak with you.”
“No.”
“You have to stand up to him.”
“No.”
“Ben and I can’t keep defending you.”
“You call what you do defending?”
“Don’t let him talk to you like that—and in front of Alice!”
“She finds him charming.”
“She finds everyone charming. That’s her gift. And soon she won’t. He’s planning to put you into quite a spot during dinner.”
“Just during dinner?”
“I’m giving you fair warning, brother. He is growing impatient.”
“Busy men are always impatient. What is it now?”
She took a breath. “Is Ben coming today?”
Harry glanced at her, amused. “Not just Ben but also his mother. Are you going to try to get on her good side?”
“Why would I need to? Stop being cheeky. Oh, Harry, you have to defend yourself.”
Getting up, he took his books and walked over to where Esther was sitting by the window in the leather armchair. He sat on the low footstool by her side, and, looking up at her, said, “But it’s so much more fun when you come to my Pyrrhic rescue, Esther. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Patting his head, Esther laughed. She had a good, hearty laugh, like a man’s—though she herself was nothing like a man. She was subdued and proper, never flirtatious or coquettish, but what reduced her occasional severity and gave her an ephemeral air was her skin: it was the color of parchment because she never went in the sun without a parasol, even on Revere Beach. Her translucence made her seem fragile, but despite her narrow bone structure, her thin face and nose, her slender slits of eyes, Esther was tough and strong. Her voice was the genteel voice of a well-born woman who was aware of her position, and yet its alto pitch made it sound as if she could swear like the sailors on the Long Wharf. She didn’t swear, of course. But Harry knew what she was capable of, should she so choose. “Let’s have it, Esther. What will it be about today? My future?”
“Yes, and no. Your and Alice’s future.”
“Ugh.”
Alice was the only child of Orville Porter who owned the Massachusetts East Timber Company, which supplied Herman Barrington with lumber for most of his construction projects. Alice was sporadically enrolled at the Society for the Collegiate Instruction of Women, which had a few years earlier begun offering university-level instruction to women, though without the attendant Bachelor of Arts degree. It had also renamed itself Radcliffe College, after Ann Radcliffe, a colonial philanthropist. When they first met, Ben had mentioned to Alice that Harry’s family were also colonial philanthropists, to which Harry said, how philanthropic could they have been? They still have all of their money. This made Alice laugh. So though Alice wasn’t swayed by Harry’s position in life, she was swayed by Harry.
They started dating, cautiously. That was two years ago when he was a sophomore; now he was entering his fourth and final year, and it occurred to him that they were still dating, cautiously. They were both still young, he reasoned, Alice barely twenty-one. Also, he had a few poorly developed concerns about their mutual suitability. He was bookish, while she was very much her father’s daughter, going on river drives up north to inspect lumber, walking in her thigh-high waterproof Wellingtons on the logs, wielding her branding axe and searching for imperfections. Did Harry really want Alice searching as assiduously for his? The fallen trees had no chance under her stern boots. She was known for limbing and debarking them herself. Mostly he felt he was not good enough for her, and it was only a matter of time before she discovered it.
“Don’t worry,” Harry said to his sister. “I have everything in hand.” He looked down at the books on his lap, one of them a book he was thinking of doing his senior thesis on next year, a short story by Edward Everett Hale. Under it was volume four of the ten-volume History of the United States by George Bancroft, which he was supposed to be reading for his advanced seminar, but wasn’t.
Harry didn’t tell Esther how just last week he overheard from the open bedroom window his father and Orville and Irma Porter below on the lawn discussing the topic of their children. They talked of the proper way to do things in Boston: a family heirloom ring, a formal announcement, a modest but well-publicized engagement dinner, followed by a long, productive period during which Harry graduated and settled on a career, while Alice methodically planned their extravagant and very public nuptials. A high society ball, a fancy affair, the wedding of the new century. The way the three parents extolled the romance of it, Harry himself was drawn in.
Esther leaned into him. “He plans to ask you point blank when you intend to honor him with grandchildren.”
Harry whistled. “Isn’t that putting the cart before the horse?”
“He will ask you to put the horse before the cart.”
“At Sunday dinner? Well, better perhaps than the usual.”
“If by better you mean more mortifying, then yes. Why put poor Alice on the spot like that?”
Harry rubbed her hand. “Don’t fret, Esther. Look forward to the plank walk. I do.” They sat side by side for a few minutes. Esther seemed restless. “What’s the matter with you today?”
She shrugged. “Do I look nice?”
“As always.” And she did, with a bow in her ruffled peach blouse, a camel-colored skirt, subdued beige high-heeled pumps. Her fingernails were buffed and shiny, her makeup was light, she even wore lipstick. Esther always tried to look especially attractive on Sundays. She just seemed more anxious than usual today. “What?
