Excerpt from Fortune's Rocks by Anita Shreve, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"You are quiet, Olympia," her mother says, eyeing her carefully. Though fragile, her mother can be astute, and it is always difficult to hide from her one's true thoughts. Olympia has been, indeed, thinking about her walk along the beach, viewing it as if from beside herself, seeing the somewhat blurry and vague figure of a young woman in peach silk conveying herself to the water's edge under the scrutiny of several dozen men and boys. And in her mother's room she blushes suddenly, as if she has been caught out.

Her mother shifts slightly on the chaise. "I fear I may already be too...too tardy in this discussion," she begins diffidently, "but I cannot help but notice, indeed, I think I am quite struck by this; that is to say, I am very mindful today of certain physical characteristics of your person, and I think we must soon have a talk about certain possible future occurrences, about certain dilemmas all women have to bear."

Though the sentence cannot be parsed, her meaning can be; and Olympia shakes her head quickly or waves her hand, as though to tell her she need not go on. For she has relied heavily upon Lisette, her mother's maid, for information on matters of the body. Her mother looks startled for a moment, in the manner of someone who has hastily prepared a lengthy speech and has been stopped mid-sentence.

But then, as she sits there, Olympia observes that relief overtakes her and flatters her features.

"Someone has discussed this with you?" her mother asks.

"Lisette," Olympia says, wishing the conversation over.

"When was this?"

"Some time ago."

"Oh. I have wondered."

And Olympia wonders, too, at the silence of Lisette regarding the daughter of her mistress. She hopes the woman will not receive a scolding for this confidence.

"You are settled?" her mother asks quickly, eager now as well to change the subject. "You are happy here?"

"Quite happy," Olympia answers, which is true and is what her mother wants to hear. It is essential that her mother's placidity not be disturbed.

At the window, Josiah moves the ladder, causing both of them to look up in his direction.

"I wonder...." her mother says, musing to herself. "Do you think Josiah a handsome man?"

Olympia looks at the figure framed seemingly in mid-air. He has light-brown hair that waves back from a high forehead and a narrow face that seems in keeping with the length of his slim build. Mildly astonished as Olympia always is by any sudden and surprising crack in her mother's long-practiced poise, she cannot think of how to answer her.

"Do you imagine that he keeps a mistress in Ely Falls?" her mother asks, pretending to wickedness. But then, after a brief heartbeat of silence, during which Olympia imagines she hears her mother's longing for (and immediate dismissal of) another life, she answers herself: "No, I suppose not," she says.

Altogether, it is a day on which everyone around Olympia seems to be behaving oddly. She does not know whether this is a consequence of truly altered behavior on their part, or of her perception of herself, which she thinks she must be giving off, like a scent. How else to explain the uncharacteristic inarticulateness of her father, or the forays of her mother into subjects she normally avoids?

"I should like you to take the tray with you when you go. To help Josiah, who is quite overwhelmed I fear."

Olympia is not as surprised by this non-sequitur as she might be, since her mother has a gift for abandoning subjects she has suddenly decided she does not wish to discuss further. Olympia stands up from the chaise and bends to lift the silver tray, happy to help Josiah, whom she likes. She is relieved to be dismissed.

"You must be more protective of yourself," her mother says as she leaves the room.

© 1999 by Anita Shreve