Excerpt: Danger and Deviance

December 1970
Part One: The Darkness of Deviance

In Virginia's historical and wealthy Loudoun County, the grand estate of Demeter's Voyage glittered in the winter with its extravagant display of holiday season finery. Every Christmas, the Prescott family transformed their palatial residence into a dazzling winter fantasy wonderland. Thousands of brilliant white lights lit up the trees than lined the main driveway to the house, and the snow-covered boxwood hedges were draped with tiny gold, red, and green lights. There were live reindeer flown in from the wilderness of the northernmost reaches of Canada, and some of the tamer, more docile reindeer were bedecked with ropes of bells. An animated, lighted statue of Santa Claus on a sleigh and a lifesize Nativity scene were displayed for all to see one of the estate's main front landscape. Long, sparkling garlands of gold, silver, red, and green were positioned on spiral topiaries in large stone urns that flanked the huge dark green front door of the residence. Holly branches and strategically-placed poinsetta blooms were wrapped around the towering Doric columns, and a wreath nearly five feet in diameter with scented pinecones and metallic ornaments sparkled brilliantly to greet guests. Hundreds of candles were lit nightly by the many servants in every window and every glass lantern on the plantation porch. The house seemed virtually lit from within, a stately yet cheerful beacon filled with Yuletide warmth.

Alphonse Frederick Prescott and the Prescott family have always been known for their generous philanthropy along with their luxurious personal lifestyles. Their lavish, showy parties and balls dominated the Virginia high society scene for more than a century. Alphonse's marriage to the beautiful socialite Andriana Villliard Thorne was one of the most coveted social invitations in both the Southern states and the Eastern seaboard during the summer of 1952. For the past five years, however, on December 15th, there was also another grand and extravagant social event, not for any charity or benefit or marriage between two plutocratic families, but for the birthday bash of Alphonse's only son and future heir, Andrew Washington Stuart Prescott.