The President's Daughter Page 17

  "Not at all. Blythe's relationship with Graham was not a casual fling. Oh, maybe it started out as merely a flirtation between a powerful man and a beautiful young woman, I don't know. I didn't know how it started." Jude looked skyward. So much more to say, and she didn't want to continue.... "Blythe said that they were soul mates. That they were deeply in love."

  "And that's what Simon wanted to talk to you about? About your friend's affair with the President?"

  "Yes."

  "Couldn't he have found that in newspapers or magazines from the seventies?"

  "Back then, things weren't as openly discussed. Actually, no one knew about their affair. The ironic thing is that he—Graham—had this reputation for being so moral. A great family man—"

  "And no one who knew about it spilled?" Dina nodded. "Impressive that he was able to keep the lid on it. But I don't know what all this has to do with you and why you're so upset about it."

  "Well, the piece of the story that Simon Keller hadn't known about when he first came here was that Blythe had had a child by Hayward." Jude's eyes began to well with tears, but she forced her voice to remain steady. "A baby girl. A few months later, Blythe died...."

  "I'm sorry about your friend, Mom." Dina patted her mother's shoulder. "What happened to the baby?"

  Jude took one last long, deep breath.

  "I raised her as my daughter."

  Dina's head tilted slightly to one side, as if she was trying to understand. "I'm not following this. I'm confused—"

  "You were that baby, Dina."

  "Mom, that's crazy."

  "It's the truth."

  "No, it isn't." Dina shook her head. "No, it's not."

  "Sweetheart, I'm so sorry."

  "No. No, this can't be true." Dina pushed Jude away and stood on trembling legs.

  "I know I should have told you a long time ago. But I promised her and then—"

  "No. I don't believe this." Dina began to pace. "How could this be? I don't understand."

  "Dina, please sit down and let me explain...." Jude reached for Dina's hands and found them suddenly cold. She began to rub them the way she had when Dina was little and had just come in from playing in the snow.

  "Explain?" Dina pulled her hands away and appeared blank for a long moment. "How can you explain that I'm not your child? I'm not your child?"

  "I think you need to hear the entire story."

  "There's more?" Rage began to replace the confusion in Dina's eyes. "You've been lying to me all my life. Isn't that enough?"

  "It wasn't because I wanted to—"

  "How could you have lied to me all of my life?" Dina was shaking from head to toe. "How could you not be my mother?"

  "Dina ..." Jude whispered, feeling more helpless than she ever had.

  "Who are you?" Dina cried. "Who are you if you're not my mother?"

  "Dina, please, if you'll calm down and listen—"

  "Calm down? You tell me that everything I ever thought I knew about you—everything I knew about myself—is a lie, that my whole life, my whole existence, is a lie, and you think I should calm down?"

  Dina's breath began to come in sharp, shallow spurts, and tears ran down her face. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"

  "Because after Blythe died, your father made me swear not to."

  "Why would he do that?"

  "Because he was afraid for you. Afraid that someone would want to harm you if the truth came out."

  "Why?"

  "Because Blythe's death had not been an accident. You were only a few months old when she died." Jude knew she was leaving out a lot but figured this was probably not the time to go into detail.

  "Why are you telling me now?"

  "Because after what happened tonight... I just can't believe that it's coincidence. And I can't justify risking another 'accident.' I've already put you at risk by not telling you sooner."

  "You don't think it was Simon, do you?"

  "No ... I don't know what I think. I don't know who to trust or who to turn to." Jude rose, wringing her hands. "I can understand how shocked you are, how hurt you are, and I'm more sorry than I can ever say. Yes, I've lied to you all your life. I won't blame you if you hate me, if you leave and never come back. But through the years, I've done the best that I could to keep you safe. Even now, nothing is more important to me than your safety."

  "Will you tell me everything?" Dina studied the face of the woman who stood before her.

  Jude nodded, her sad eyes never leaving her daughter's face. "I met Blythe my freshman year in college. We had one or two classes together and lived on the same floor in the same dorm, but that's all we had in common. She was beautiful and rich and everyone admired her. I was poor and only managed to get to college with heavy financial aid. Somehow we became friends—no one was more surprised than I was when she asked me to room with her sophomore year. Our personalities just seemed to complement each other, and over the years, we became the best of friends. That friendship lasted until the day she died."

  Jude swallowed hard. All else aside, it was still sometimes difficult to speak of Blythe.

  "Anyway, after college, I went right to Arizona to attend graduate school. Blythe went to Europe for six months, then decided to live in D.C. Her father was Ambassador to Belgium and kept an apartment there."

  "How did she meet President Hayward?"

  "She first met him at a reception that she attended with her father. Their paths crossed several times after that, when she'd been invited to attend a dinner in honor of a Belgian artist after her father had returned to Brussels. After that, I'm not really certain how the relationship progressed. I do know that over the following year or so Blythe attended a lot of White House functions as the date of the President's best friend. A man named Miles Kendall."

  "That name is familiar." Dina frowned.

  "He's been in the news. He died recently." Jude rubbed her temples. "Simon Keller had met with Miles while beginning the research for his book on Hayward. Miles was suffering from Alzheimer's. He apparently told Simon about the affair."

  "And told him that Blythe had had Graham's child?"

  Jude shook her head, "I'm not certain that he hadn't figured that out for himself."

  "How?"

  "He'd paid a visit to Blythe's sister, who'd apparently shown him photos of Blythe. When he came here seeking information about Blythe's affair with Hayward, I don't think he had any idea that there had been a child."

  "Then how did he know?"

  "I think he knew as soon as he saw you that you were Blythe's child. You look so much like your mother, Dina."

  Dina winced at the reference.

  "I'm sorry, honey, but anyone who knew Blythe would know whose daughter you really are."

  "Then how did you think you could hide it?"

  "Here, in this small town, the chances of running into anyone who had known Blythe Pierce were pretty remote."

  "That's why you didn't want me to go to school so close to D.C.," Dina said.

  Jude nodded.

  "How did Simon find you?"

  "Blythe's sister told him where I was."

  "Does she know about me?"

  "Yes."

  "Then why would she tell him where to find you?"

  "I don't know. I've been trying to figure that out myself."

  "Have you asked her?"

  "No. It's been a while since we've been in touch. We had a disagreement some years ago."

  "Why?"

  "Because Betsy wanted... to be a bigger part of your life than I felt she should be. She wanted you to know your Pierce relatives, but I resisted. I said that I was afraid that the situation would be too confusing to you as a child. You'd wonder what your connection was to Betsy. But looking back, I think the real reason was that I was selfish and shortsighted and utterly wrong. I knew that eventually I'd have to tell you everything, but I just kept putting it off and putting it off. ..." Jude spread her hands helplessly before her. "I've always thought
of you as mine, Dina. I can't help it. I know that someone else gave birth to you, but I've always felt in my heart that you were mine. I'm sorry. I know it's not a good-enough reason to have kept you from your .. . blood relatives ... all these years. But I loved you so much, wanted so much for it to be true—"

  "I can't hear any more." Dina clapped her hands over her ears. "I just can't hear any more of this."

  "Dina ..." Jude rose to follow her.

  "Don't." Dina held up a hand as if to keep Jude away. "I need to go. I need to get out of here."

  Dina fled through the gate that stood between the garage and the house.

  "Dina ..." Jude called from the gate.

  Dina was halfway down the driveway when she stopped and looked back to ask, "Did she name me, or did you?"

  Jude leaned against the gate and held on to it for support.

  "She did," Jude whispered. "It was her grandmother's name."

  Dina turned and ran, trying to escape from words she could no longer bear to hear and a reality she could not comprehend.

  A tearful Jude let her go, knowing that all she could do was pray that once the shock had passed Dina would forgive her. And that someday maybe she'd be back.

  Not true, not true, not true, not true, not true ...

  The words echoed over and over and over in Dina's head, like a bell that would not stop ringing.

  She parked her car in front of the carriage house, though she barely recalled having driven home, and simply sat there, staring blankly out the window, trying to make sense of what had happened. The hollow area inside her had spread until she felt empty, as if everything had been removed and the void where her organs had once rested had been filled with a terrible chill.

  From an open window somewhere she heard a phone ring several times. With no sense of urgency, she opened the car door, slid out, and walked woodenly into her house. She sat on the edge of a small side chair in her living room and looked out the window with eyes that saw nothing beyond the frame.

  How can you not know that your mother isn't really your mother? And this man who had been her father ...

  A former President of the United States.

  How absurd. Who could believe such a thing?

  Dina picked up the photo of Frank McDermott that stood on a nearby table, the same photo that was prominently displayed in Jude's home. "Who did you think I was? Did you know the truth?"

  A million questions gathered, ebbed and flowed, until Dina's head began to pound. There was no escape from the incessant buzz between her ears. She went upstairs and lay across her bed, hugging her pillow.

  There was a family she had never met, had never even heard of until this day. Blythe had had a sister, Jude had said.

  I have an aunt.

  Are there grandparents, then, too? Cousins?

  Did Hayward have other children? There was a son, wasn't there? A congressman or senator, something ... Dina thought she recalled hearing something about him. Were there other offspring?

  Do they know about me?

  Blythe's sister knows about me....

  From some place deep inside the barest remnant of a long-forgotten image emerged. Dina closed her eyes and was, for the briefest of moments, enveloped by scent. Gardenia, she recognized it now, though she was certain that at the time she did not know its name or the name of the woman who wore it. That she had been tall and blond and had kind eyes Dina remembered, even as she remembered the touch of the softest fabric against her cheek when the woman knelt to embrace her.

  Her fairy godmother. That's how Dina had come to think of the woman who always arrived laden with a mountain of beautifully wrapped presents. Always on birthdays, always on Christmas, sometimes just because. Dina tried to remember the woman's voice, but it was too far lost in time. The visits had stopped the year she turned five. She'd never gotten a clear explanation of why, and though the woman had appeared in her dreams for several years thereafter, over time the memory had faded.

  Had that been Blythe's sister?

  Dina went into her closet and reached for the half-forgotten wooden box that she kept on the shelf, the box in which she kept odd pieces from her childhood. She sat in the middle of the bed and opened it, searching through the treasured contents for that one item she sought.

  The gold ring—a high school ring, Dina had realized as she grew older—the initials BDP engraved inside, the name of the school, "The Shipley School 1964," in script across the front. The ring that her fairy godmother had tucked into her hand that last time she visited. The ring that Dina had instinctively kept from Jude for years. When she'd finally asked about it, Jude's jaw had set squarely and she'd told Dina it had belonged to a cousin of hers. For reasons that Dina couldn't have explained, she hadn't believed her mother.

  Dina slipped the ring on her finger.

  Blythe's high school ring.

  Dina held it up to her face. Where, she wondered, was the Shipley School? Had Blythe been smart? Popular? Athletic? What had she cared about when she was a student there? How had she gone from that place to falling in love with a President and bearing his child?

  Mom—Jude—would know. Jude knew it all. Had known it all.

  Suddenly the room seemed too small to contain Dina's anger. Her spirit agitated and her heart restless, she wandered outside into the dark fields. Across the rows where the winter's freezing and thawing of the soil had caused the earth to heave, Dina walked, kicking a clump of dirt here and there, her thoughts a jumble. She sat down under a lone willow tree at the edge of the lake that formed the far boundary of her property. All was still, all quiet, a stark contrast to the rage that came and went inside her. She leaned back against the tree and cried, the sobs cracking the silence of the night like crisp claps of thunder that sent several small creatures that rustled in the grasses nearby to seek other shelter.

  Perhaps if she cried enough her tears would flush away the anger, wash away the pain.

  A flashback to the conversation with her mother and the way Jude had shaken. Fear, Dina now knew. It had been fear that had caused Jude to tremble.

  "I'm afraid, too, Mom," she whispered aloud. "If I'm not your child, if I'm not Dina McDermott, who in the name of God am I?"

  The sun had barely broken through the early-morning haze when Waylon nudged Jude and whined to be let out.

  "Waylon, go away. It's too early," Jude, who'd lain awake all night, muttered, and turned over, still hoping that sleep might come, if only for an hour.

  Waylon stood up on his short hind legs, leaned against the side of the bed, and whined a little louder.

  "Oh, for pity's sake." Jude tossed the thin blanket aside. "All right. Let's go."

  In bare feet and green-and-white striped pajamas, Jude padded down the steps, following the eager hound, who seemed especially lively for so early in the morning. Jude unlocked the door and pushed it open for Waylon to go out, then stood, frozen on the spot, as the dog bounced upon the figure seated on the top step.

  Without turning around, Dina asked in a hoarse voice, "Do you remember when I was eight or nine and wanted to play softball with the girls club and they wouldn't let a kid sign up unless at least one parent agreed to volunteer for something? When they called and asked you to be assistant coach, you said sure, even though you knew nothing about the game, because you were afraid they wouldn't let me play if you said no. The next day, you came home from the library with your arms filled with books on baseball, stacked so high you could barely carry them all."

  Dina paused momentarily, then added, "I didn't have the heart to tell you that softball and baseball weren't exactly the same thing."

  "I wondered why they moved me from coaching to selling water ice at the snack bar after the second game," Jude said softly.

  "Remember when I was ten and I nominated you for the Father of the Year Award?" Dina could barely get the words out.

  "I remember," Jude whispered, the pride she'd felt in that long-ago moment pinching her heart. Oh, yes, baby, I
remember....

  "I want to go back to who I was yesterday at just this time," Dina said. "I want to be Dina McDermott again."

  "You are—"

  "No, I'm not. I don't even know what my name really is. Is it Pierce? Is it Hayward?"

  "Legally—"

  "Legally doesn't mean a damned thing to me right now. If you're talking about what's on my birth certificate, that's just a piece of paper. What does that have to do with who I am?" Dina's voice was husky from lack of sleep and a fair amount of sobbing.

  "Dina, if you want to change your name ..."

  Dina turned around and looked up to meet Jude's eyes, and Jude recognized the anger, the unbearable hurt, and what was left of her heart shattered.

  "Tell me what you want, Dina."

  "I want you to be my mother." The words ripped from her throat.

  "In my heart, you are—have always been, will always be—my daughter. What I did was so wrong, and nothing I can say will make it less wrong. The lie remains. But that I have loved you with all my heart since the moment of your birth, that is the truth. The purest truth."

  Nodding very slowly, Dina said softly, "I know."

  "Honey, if I could change this, if I could take the hurt away from you, I would."

  "I know that, too."

  "I don't know what to do for you," Jude said sadly. "I feel so helpless. I would do anything if I could just go back in time and undo what I've done."

  Jude sat down, then somewhat tentatively put her arm around Dina's shoulders. When Dina did not push her away, Jude rested Dina's head on her shoulder, as she had done so many times in the past when her daughter was hurting.

  "I've never felt this kind of anger before. It's frightening me, it's so enormous. It's overshadowing everything else right now. But at the same time, I know that I can't not love you, Mom. Whatever else is true, I can't not think of you as my mother."

  "Thank you, darling." Jude stroked Dina's hair, filled with gratitude for this unexpected gift. It was more than she'd ever dared hope for.

  Together they sat, wrapped in the morning. There would be time to talk more later, time for more questions and more answers, for the airing of more anger and the shedding of more tears.