Seidel, Kathleen Gilles Read Free

Ransome's article. The photograph on the first page, dulled by the Xeroxing, was the movie's most famous still—Phillip gripping his sister-in-law, Mary Deas, by her shoulders as they stood in front of the burning barn. On the next page, Jill knew, would be a photograph of her father, her brilliant, devoted father. She didn't turn the page. He had been dead for two years, but it still hurt.
    He used to tuck her into a corner of his deep chair and tell her stories about his boyhood home. He told her about the Valley's sweet limestone soil, its wooded hills and gently rolling farmlands. The Valley had been the "grainery of the Confederacy," sheltering Stonewall Jackson's fifteen thousand men, paralyzing fifty thousand hard-worn Yankees. Cass had spoken of the Valley proudly, longingly.
    Jill's eyes stung as she thought about her father's death. She felt her lips tighten, her throat close. She blinked quickly. There, on the sofa across from her, was Phillip. Phillip will understand. He knows what it's like to lose someone, he knows what I've been through these two years.
    Suddenly this man having come wasn't funny and delicious. It was strange, unsettling. He was a stranger to her; she had to remember that. There was no reason for him to understand her any more than would any other stranger.
    She spoke carefully. "What can I do for you?"
    "I realize the movie was made before you were born, but did your father ever talk to you about how it was made?"
    "A little, but it was a difficult time for him." Jill willed her voice into an even cadence. "His first marriage was breaking up. All I remember was him speaking well of your uncles, especially Bix." Actually, Jill didn't recall her father ever mentioning Charles, the brother who had played Booth. "He said Bix was a true gentleman, which wasn't something he said about many people."
    "Did he ever say anything to contradict this article?" Doug gestured to the papers still in Jill's lap.
    "No." What an odd question. "He certainly didn't dwell on his own role as much as the article does, but he wouldn't have." Cass had never been arrogant. He hadn't needed to be. His pictures had always been popular with moviegoers, and his reputation among the critics was as steady as anyone's ever was. "Why do you ask?"
    "How interested are you in this movie?"
    Did he always answer a question with a question? "It got me through puberty," she answered lightly. "I owe it a great debt."
    He was sitting forward now, his elbows resting on his knees, his Phillip-Wayland eyes in direct contact with hers, confiding, urgent. "Great enough to help me find out what really happened?"
    Bells went off, clanging, screeching warning bells shrieking at the base of Jill's skull. This was not Phillip Wayland who would sweep her off her feet and understand all her troubles. She had to keep that absolutely clear. This was a twentieth-century man with his own twentieth-century agenda. She didn't know what he wanted from her, but clearly he wanted something.
    She was curious, but she was determined to be cautious. She happened to be rich, and rich people were manipulated enough. "What do you mean? Is there something wrong with the article?"
    "I don't know for sure."
    That was crap. He certainly believed something or he wouldn't have come here. "But?" she prompted.
    "But my family tells a different story."
    First he reviewed the "official" story. The movie had been shot in March and April of 1948, with the location work having been done in the Valley during April. Shortly thereafter the studio executives had rejected the rough cut. During June and July Cass had helped draft a new script. The movie had gone back into production in August. Only part of what had been shot in March and April had been used in the final version.
    Jill knew all that. She listened politely, growing more uneasy. What did he want from her? She wished he would get to the point.
    He continued. "My grandfather—Bix's father—told me that when Bix and