father. Actually, the father was neither proud nor present.
No one was present for the birth of Clayton Terrell Knight, save his frail, suffering mother and a half-blind midwife. The father would not learn of his son’s birth until, tired and broke, he wandered back home after three days’ absence in need of a shave and a hot meal.
Clay Knight’s father was a darkly handsome, charming, uneducated man with little passion for home and hearth. Family and responsibility held little appeal for the lackadaisical, happy-go-lucky Jackson Knight. Nor, for that matter, did honest labor.
He had a propensity for the more exciting pursuits life had to offer. Like drinking. And gambling. And women.
There were occasions when Jackson Knight devoted his full and undivided attention to one of that trio of favorite vices. Other times he indulged in all three at once. Acquaintances agreed that nobody had more fun than the silver-eyed, black-haired Jackson Knight when he was seated at a green baize poker table with a bourbon in one hand, glassine cards in the other, and a buxom beauty on his knee.
Life was not so much fun for his neglected wife, Anna. She had married beneath her, against the wishes of her widowed father, the naval hero of 1812, Admiral Clayton L. Tigart. The aging commodore hadn’t approved of the match. But he loved his only daughter, so he gave the young couple his modest life’s savings as a wedding present.
The money hadn’t gone toward building a home for Anna, as the admiral had intended. The hedonistic Jackson Knight had squandered the entire sum in less than a year, with nothing to show for it. Anna never saw a penny of the money.
The love she’d had for Jackson Knight had waned and died in the long, lonely hours she’d spent waiting alone in the darkness for him to come staggering home, the scent of another woman’s cheap perfume on his clothes and on his lean body.
For the disillusioned Anna, her precious baby son, Clayton, was the only good thing to come out of the unhappy union with his handsome, worthless father. It didn’t matter, she told herself, that her son’s father was of the lower classes and considered white trash by the gentry. Clayton could boast of at least one distinguished forebear, his maternal grandfather.
One morning just before dawn, when Clay was still an infant, word came that Jackson Knight had been knifed to death in a saloon brawl.
For young Anna Knight, it was no great shock or loss. The only real change his death would make in her hard life would be the extra money she’d now have to buy food and necessities. No longer would Jackson Knight be there to take her meager earnings to fritter away on liquor, gambling, and women.
After her husband’s death, Anna Knight was able to save enough to move with her baby son into a modest frame house in Germantown less a mile from the city. Proud of the new place, Anna fixed it up happily, transforming the plain house into a warm, cozy home. The finishing touches were added when she carefully hung a framed picture of her father, the commodore, directly above the fireplace in the parlor.
With freedom from constant worry, Anna had a chance to catch her breath. She had the time and the energy to develop her innate talent for designing and making beautiful women’s clothing.
Her reputation started to build. Word of mouth began to spread, reaching all the way to Memphis’s wealthy elite. In time, Anna’s flair for fashion caused her services to be vied for by the upper crust of the river city. She supported herself and her son by making elegant clothes for the city’s gentry.
It was Anna’s abundant talent that brought her to the attention of the young, wealthy mistress of Longwood. At a society ball honoring a visiting European count, Julie Preble’s discerning eye fell upon one of Anna Knight’s gorgeous creations. It was worn by a thin, graying Memphis matron who was more than happy to share the name and address of its
No one was present for the birth of Clayton Terrell Knight, save his frail, suffering mother and a half-blind midwife. The father would not learn of his son’s birth until, tired and broke, he wandered back home after three days’ absence in need of a shave and a hot meal.
Clay Knight’s father was a darkly handsome, charming, uneducated man with little passion for home and hearth. Family and responsibility held little appeal for the lackadaisical, happy-go-lucky Jackson Knight. Nor, for that matter, did honest labor.
He had a propensity for the more exciting pursuits life had to offer. Like drinking. And gambling. And women.
There were occasions when Jackson Knight devoted his full and undivided attention to one of that trio of favorite vices. Other times he indulged in all three at once. Acquaintances agreed that nobody had more fun than the silver-eyed, black-haired Jackson Knight when he was seated at a green baize poker table with a bourbon in one hand, glassine cards in the other, and a buxom beauty on his knee.
Life was not so much fun for his neglected wife, Anna. She had married beneath her, against the wishes of her widowed father, the naval hero of 1812, Admiral Clayton L. Tigart. The aging commodore hadn’t approved of the match. But he loved his only daughter, so he gave the young couple his modest life’s savings as a wedding present.
The money hadn’t gone toward building a home for Anna, as the admiral had intended. The hedonistic Jackson Knight had squandered the entire sum in less than a year, with nothing to show for it. Anna never saw a penny of the money.
The love she’d had for Jackson Knight had waned and died in the long, lonely hours she’d spent waiting alone in the darkness for him to come staggering home, the scent of another woman’s cheap perfume on his clothes and on his lean body.
For the disillusioned Anna, her precious baby son, Clayton, was the only good thing to come out of the unhappy union with his handsome, worthless father. It didn’t matter, she told herself, that her son’s father was of the lower classes and considered white trash by the gentry. Clayton could boast of at least one distinguished forebear, his maternal grandfather.
One morning just before dawn, when Clay was still an infant, word came that Jackson Knight had been knifed to death in a saloon brawl.
For young Anna Knight, it was no great shock or loss. The only real change his death would make in her hard life would be the extra money she’d now have to buy food and necessities. No longer would Jackson Knight be there to take her meager earnings to fritter away on liquor, gambling, and women.
After her husband’s death, Anna Knight was able to save enough to move with her baby son into a modest frame house in Germantown less a mile from the city. Proud of the new place, Anna fixed it up happily, transforming the plain house into a warm, cozy home. The finishing touches were added when she carefully hung a framed picture of her father, the commodore, directly above the fireplace in the parlor.
With freedom from constant worry, Anna had a chance to catch her breath. She had the time and the energy to develop her innate talent for designing and making beautiful women’s clothing.
Her reputation started to build. Word of mouth began to spread, reaching all the way to Memphis’s wealthy elite. In time, Anna’s flair for fashion caused her services to be vied for by the upper crust of the river city. She supported herself and her son by making elegant clothes for the city’s gentry.
It was Anna’s abundant talent that brought her to the attention of the young, wealthy mistress of Longwood. At a society ball honoring a visiting European count, Julie Preble’s discerning eye fell upon one of Anna Knight’s gorgeous creations. It was worn by a thin, graying Memphis matron who was more than happy to share the name and address of its
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