"It was business, not seduction."
"You went out to dinner with him several times, too."
"We are friends, Mrs. Seaton. But not lovers."
"Only because something better came along," Edith shot back hoarsely. "You dropped my Jeremy like a hot potato when Nick Harte started to date you. Don't deny it."
"I do deny it. Every single word. You're putting your own spin on this, Edith, but I think deep down you know that it isn't the truth."
"You caused trouble between Jeremy and Nick the same way Claudia Banner did with Mitchell Madison and Sullivan Harte."
"So you took the painting the night of the storm and tried to destroy my good name in a noble attempt to defend Jeremy from my wiles?" Octavia shook her head. "I'm not buying that, Edith."
Edith sat in rigid, stubborn silence.
"Do you know what I think?" Octavia sat down in the chair across from the older woman. "I think you used Jeremy as an excuse to take revenge for something that Claudia Banner did to you all those years ago. She is beyond your reach and maybe you told yourself you had put it all behind you. But when you realized that I was her niece, the old anger came rushing back, didn't it?"
Edith flinched. "She got away with it. But then, Claudia Banner got away with everything. She never paid for the trouble and pain she caused."
"Tell me what my great-aunt did to you, Edith."
"She seduced my husband." Edith surged up out of her chair. "And then she used him."
Octavia was on her feet now. "How did she use him?"
"Phil was the accountant for Harte-Sullivan. She got him to doctor the company books while she carried out her scam. That was the reason Mitchell and Sullivan never saw the bankruptcy coming until it was too late."
Octavia drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I see."
"It was as if she was some sort of sorceress," Edith whispered. "She put my Phil under a spell for a time. The poor fool never realized how she'd manipulated him until he woke up one morning and discovered that she had vanished. He actually thought that she would contact him after the heat died down. He really believed that she loved him and wanted him to run off with her. It was months before he finally understood that he'd been used."
"Was that when you discovered his role in the bankruptcy?"
"Yes. I'd suspected he was having an affair with her, but I never dreamed that she had seduced him into helping her drive Harte-Madison into bankruptcy. I was stunned. He was a Seaton, after all. How could he do something like that?"
"But you kept the secret."
"I had no choice. I had to think of the family name. I had the children to consider. Just imagine what they would have had to face here in Eclipse Bay if it had come out that their father had had a hand in the destruction of Harte-Madison."
"It would have been rough on them."
"And then there was the financial situation. If the truth had surfaced, my husband's career as an accountant would have been destroyed. At the very least the shame and humiliation would have forced us to leave town. Where would we have gone? This was our home."
"So you buried the past as best you could. Your husband never told Mitchell and Sullivan what he'd done."
"Of course not. I pointed out to him that there was nothing to be gained by confessing his part in their disaster and everything to lose."
"You succeeded in protecting your husband and the Seaton name, but you never forgave him or Aunt Claudia."
"I swear she was some sort of witch. She never paid for her wicked works. Probably never even gave her victims a second thought."
"You're wrong there, Edith. Aunt Claudia thought about the past a lot toward the end. In a way, she was obsessed with it."
There was no need to get into the specifics, Octavia thought. No point bringing up the fact that Claudia had never even mentioned the name Seaton during those times when she had talked about her adventures in Eclipse Bay. The only people who had concerned her at the end had been the Hartes and the Madisons.
"I have no right to ask you to forgive me for what I did," Edith said. "My only excuse is that, for a while after
I discovered who you were, I went a little mad. It was as if a curtain had opened and I was looking at the past again. It all came crashing back and the only thing I could think about was punishing that dreadful woman."
"It's called visiting the sins of the father on the son, or in this case, visiting the sins of the great-aunt on the niece."
"I told myself I was doing it to show Jeremy and Nick the truth about you, but you're right, of course. I did it to avenge myself."
"So you took the Upsall and started the rumors that I was the thief."
"When I finally came to my senses, it was too late. It will all come out now, won't it? What Phil did in the past and what I tried to do to you. This time I won't be able to keep the stain off the family name. Jeremy will be embarrassed. The rest of the family and most of the people in town will think I've gone senile. And as for my friends—" Edith trailed off, bowing her head.
So much for nearly four decades of Wednesday and Saturday bridge games and civic committee meetings, Octavia thought. Even if the community and her friends were willing to forget the affair, Edith would never be able to hold her head up high in Eclipse Bay again.
She put a hand on one of Edith's thin shoulders. "You know, it was Aunt Claudia who urged me on her deathbed to come to Eclipse Bay. She said she wanted me to see if perhaps I could repair some of the damage she had done here. I assumed that she was referring to the Harte-Madison feud, and I have to tell you that I was feeling pretty useless because the Hartes and the Madisons took care of that issue all by themselves."
Edith took a hankie out of the pocket of her old robe and dabbed at her eyes. "Yes. Those two stubborn men seem to have become friends again."
"They didn't need me," Octavia said. "But maybe I was looking in the wrong place. Maybe this was the damage I was supposed to repair."
"I don't understand," Edith said.
"I know. I'll explain it to you while you get dressed. Hurry, we don't have a lot of time."
"It's very kind of you to want to help me after what I did to you, but it's too late, my dear. The truth will be all over town by nightfall. It's only right after all this time."
"You're going to have to trust me on this, Edith. For Jeremy's sake and the Seaton family name."