“I live here part of the time.” He moved ahead of her into the living room and switched on a lamp beside the couch. “I rent this apartment in the city so I have a place to sleep when I’m too tired to drive all the way home. Sometimes a meeting lasts too long or the theater runs late… or I drink too much,” he added with a laugh, “and so I spend the night here.” He moved around the room as he talked, switching on another lamp, shrugging off his coat. He helped Fiona remove her coat and hung them both in the front closet. “I have a home in Westchester, where I live most of the time. You understand that my wife and children are living there, too, until the divorce is final. I have an obligation to provide for them. Would you like a tour of the place?”
“Okay.”
He held her hand as he led her around. The apartment was neat and spacious and clean—and smelled of Arthur’s scent. The kitchen was very modern with an electric icebox and built-in cabinets. The tiled bathroom had a sink and a toilet and a claw-footed bathtub big enough for Fiona to luxuriate in. And she wouldn’t even have to haul the hot water first—it came right out of the tap. There were radiators in every room, and the apartment was comfortably warm all over. Fiona thought of the two drafty rooms where she lived with her father, and Arthur’s apartment began to seem like a mansion after all. Even Wickham Hall didn’t have central heating or so many modern conveniences. She imagined living here with Arthur and tears came to her eyes.
“Well, what do you think of it?” he asked when they returned to the living room.
“It’s lovely, Arthur… and so clean.” She realized that it had been a stupid thing to say when he laughed out loud.
“I have Mrs. Murphy, my cleaning lady, to thank for that. Have a seat, Fiona.” He went to the refrigerator and retrieved a bottle while she made herself comfortable on the sofa. “I’ve been saving this for a special occasion. Do you like champagne?”
“I’ve never tasted it.”
“Then you must try some.” He crossed to a bar in one corner of the living room and took out two glasses. His movements were smooth and elegant, and she loved watching everything he did. When the cork came free with a hollow pop, Arthur sat down on the sofa beside her to pour the champagne.
“To the most beautiful woman in New York City,” he said, raising his glass for a toast. “To us—and to a new beginning in 1921.” They touched glasses and kissed, then Fiona took a sip.
“It has bubbles!”
“Do you like it?”
“Yes, it’s wonderful.”
By the time she finished her first glass she felt relaxed and happier than she’d ever felt in her life. Arthur poured a second glass for each of them, then took off his tuxedo jacket and tossed it on a chair. He pulled off his bow tie and loosened his collar and cuffs.
“That’s better,” he sighed.
“I’ve never seen you without a jacket and tie,” Fiona said, laughing.
“You look very… content.”
“May I turn off the lights for a minute? I want to show you something.” He stood and switched them off, then pulled the drapes open. From where she sat on the sofa, Fiona could see the lights of New York sparkling like stars against the black sky, with the darker void of Central Park in the distance. Snow still sifted from the sky, making the scene into a fairyland.
“Oh, Arthur! What a beautiful view!” He crossed the room to sit beside her, and they gazed out of the window together, sipping champagne.
“I’ve fallen hopelessly in love with you, Fiona,” he murmured as they finished their second glass.
“I love you, too. I wish we could stay here forever.”
He set both of their glasses on the table and pulled Fiona close, kissing her until she was breathless.
“Wait!” he said, pulling away suddenly. “I just remembered. I have a New Year’s present for you. Let me think… Where did I put it?” He searched his pockets, then stood and started opening and closing drawers to no avail. “Ah, I remember!” he said, laughing at himself. “I left it in here. Come on.” He took her hand and pulled her to her feet, leading her into his bedroom. The room whirled and swayed as Fiona walked, and she knew she had drunk too much champagne.
“Sit down and close your eyes,” he told her. She sat on the edge of the bed, sinking into its softness. The beautiful bedspread felt luxurious beneath her hand, and she knew that the mattress probably had fine linen sheets on it like the ones she used to scrub at Wickham Hall. There was artwork on the walls, and the headboard, nightstands, and dresser all matched, made with inlays of different kinds of wood. Arthur’s scent was even more powerful in here. Fiona knew she would think of this room, this bed, and weep when she returned to her squalid mattress in the tenement.
“Close your eyes,” Arthur said. Fiona obeyed, her head spinning when she did so. She heard him open a drawer in the nightstand, then close it. He took her hand and placed something in her palm. “You can look now.”
She opened her eyes and saw a black leather jeweler’s box, tied with a red ribbon. She pulled it off and opened the lid to see a beautiful golden ring with a star-sapphire stone.
“It’s a promise ring, Fiona. Please accept it with a promise of my undying love.” He pulled it out of the holder and slipped it onto her finger. “I love you, darling. Happy new year.”
She threw her arms around his neck as her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Arthur! I love you so much!” And she did—more than she ever imagined she would love anyone. “Arthur… Arthur…” she whispered as he covered her face with kisses.
Suddenly, it was as if a tidal wave of love and longing washed over her, and Fiona was lost in the deluge.
The dawning sun woke her up. Arthur hadn’t closed the bedroom drapes. For a moment Fiona didn’t know where she was. Then she saw Arthur asleep in the bed beside her, and she began to cry. What she recalled of last night had seemed wonderful at the time. But now that the champagne had worn off, she felt ashamed and embarrassed. She wondered if he had deliberately planned to seduce her this way, and if she had foolishly fallen into his trap. And she wondered if Arthur would still want her now that he’d had his way with her. She was eighteen years old and he was forty-two—and married. Fiona couldn’t hold back a sob.
Arthur stirred, then woke up and pulled her close. “No… darling, no,” he soothed. “Please don’t cry.”
“What have we done?” she wept.
“Fiona, you know in your heart that we were meant to be together this way. And we will be… forever.”
She struggled to control her tears. This was America, not Ireland. They wouldn’t lock her away with the nuns.
“I wish I could say I’m sorry,” Arthur told her, “but I’m not. And you shouldn’t be sorry, either. I love you, and I know you love me. You’re wearing my promise to you on your finger. Soon, very soon, we’ll be able to be together… always.”
She nodded, unable to reply. Her emotions were a tangled mess of happiness and shame, fear and hope. She couldn’t begin to unravel them all, especially with Arthur lying next to her, holding her.
“I need to go home. My father—” She stopped, afraid to finish. Rory Quinn would murder both of them. She began to cry again.
“Of course. I’ll let you get dressed,” Arthur said softly. He climbed out of bed and went into his dressing room next to the bathroom. Fiona couldn’t stop crying as she hurriedly put on her clothes.
“I’m coming up to your hotel suite with you so I can speak to your father,” Arthur said when he emerged from the dressing room in a suit and tie. “I’m worried that he’ll be angry with you, and I want to explain to him that it was all my fault—that we lost track of the time.”
“And it was snowing,” she added numbly. But as they drove to the hotel, Fiona worried more about what excuse she could give Arthur than what she would say to her father. Rory wouldn’t be at the hotel, of course. How could she explain his absence—so early in the morning on New Year’s Day—to Arthur?
“I think I’d bet
ter talk to my father alone,” she said when Arthur pulled his car to a stop in front. “Maybe it would be better if he didn’t know I was with you all night.”
“But I want to take full responsibility—”
“Let me talk to him first. I’ll let you know what happened when I see you tonight.” She gave him a quick good-bye kiss and hurried inside the hotel. As soon as Arthur’s car was out of sight, Fiona took the subway home to her tenement. Rory was waiting for her, pacing the floor, furious.
“Where have you been all night? I’ve been frantic, girl!”
“I’m sorry. Arthur took me to see his apartment. We had a few drinks, and before we knew it, it was too late to wander the streets. He’d had too much champagne and the weather was bad. He thought he’d better not drive.”
“Did that man seduce you? I’ll demand that he marry you if he did!”
Fiona could never tell her father that he had. Rory would have every right to demand that Arthur marry her—but Arthur, of course, was already married. Fiona could never make her father understand that Arthur did love her, that he was going to marry her just as soon as he got his divorce.
“Of course he didn’t seduce me,” she lied. “Arthur is a gentleman. He slept on the sofa. I’m sorry if we worried you, Dad. In fact, Arthur begged for a chance to come and explain everything to you himself, but he couldn’t very well do that now, could he? We don’t really have a room at the hotel, and I could hardly bring him here.”
“Don’t be playing games with me, girl. You’ll ruin all your chances for a decent life if you let him take advantage of you.”
“He gave me a ring—an engagement ring.” She held out her hand for him to see. Rory appraised it with a scowl.
“That isn’t a diamond. I thought he was rich.”
“Arthur doesn’t do things the conventional way.” She smiled, realizing even as she spoke the words that it was one of the things she loved about him. Arthur was very romantic, yet he hated the usual cliche s of romance.
“When are you seeing him again?”
“Tonight.” Fiona glanced around the dismal apartment, remembering the smooth feel of Arthur’s bed linens; the clean, tiled bathroom and modern kitchen; the view of the city and Central Park. And she remembered how Arthur had looked at her with love shining in his eyes when he’d awakened beside her this morning.
“Excuse me, Dad. I need to use to the privy.” She was going to burst into tears any moment if she had to spend one more minute in this apartment, smelling the stench of mildew and chamber pots and filth after spending the night at Arthur’s.
But as she walked past the communal outhouses, disgusted by the rundown neighborhood, her tears fell fast. Even the layer of clean, white snow couldn’t hide the ugliness. Fiona hesitated as she passed the parish church, wondering if she dared to go in. She knew she had sinned. She needed to beg God for forgiveness. But when she pictured Jesus impaled on the cross, dying in agony for her sins, she knew she could never ask such a sacrifice from Him yet again. Her sins had piled too high, the weight of them had grown much too heavy: thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, honor thy father and mother… and now adultery. Nor could she compound those sins by lying to the priest again. The nuns had taught her that Satan was the father of lies.
“If you lie, you sin twice,” the sisters had said. “The thing you’re lying about is usually a sin, and the lie doubles it!”
Fiona hadn’t sinned in ignorance but willfully. She didn’t deserve Christ’s forgiveness. She couldn’t face the priest, the crucifix.
She cried as she walked, shivering in the cold January air. How could what she had shared with Arthur be so wrong, yet be so wonderful?
Rory insisted on coming to the hotel with Fiona when she went to meet Arthur for their date that night. Fiona was terrified. Her father was going to confront Arthur and scare him away. She didn’t want to lose him.
She held her breath as the men greeted one another, and it startled her to realize that her father and Arthur were about the same age. Except for the first night that she’d met Arthur, Fiona had never thought of him as old. He was so vibrant, so exciting to be with. And her father looked a decade older from a lifetime of hard labor.
“May I buy you a cup of coffee, Mr. Quinn?” Arthur asked when he saw Rory.
“Aye, that would be fine.” They went into the hotel coffee shop and sat in a booth. Arthur and Rory both ordered coffee, but Fiona was too sick with fear to order anything.
“I’d like to ask what your intentions are for my daughter,” Rory said without preamble.
“Honorable, I assure you. I know there’s an age difference between Fiona and me, and I’m sure that must concern you. But I’ve given her a ring as a pledge of my good intentions.”
“You intend to marry her?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Shall we set a date for the wedding, then? I’ll have many arrangements to make. And the wedding must be soon, since my business may require us to return to Dublin shortly.”
What a liar her father was. Fiona felt as though she might throw up any minute. She was terrified of being found out—both by her father and by Arthur. She wasn’t sure which would be worse.
“Unfortunately, it’s not possible to set a date, at the moment,” Arthur said. “That’s why I’ve been eager to speak with you. It would help if I knew how much longer your business will require you to stay in New York and when you might be returning to Dublin.”
Rory took a sip of coffee before answering. Fiona knew he was stalling. “I’m not sure when I’m going back.”
“What exactly is your business here, Mr. Quinn—if I might ask? I have many contacts in the financial world. Perhaps we could help you get settled here on a more permanent basis. If it’s a question of financing, I would be pleased to offer a business loan to my future father-in-law.”
Fiona could scarcely breathe, fearing disaster.
“Which bank would that be, then?” Rory asked, as if he did business with dozens of banks. Arthur told him the name. “Aye, that’s a fine institution,” Rory replied. “I appreciate the offer, Mr. Bartlett, but I have all the business I can handle, at the moment.” He glanced at Fiona, then down at her sapphire ring. “Perhaps we should keep the date open for now.”
“Thank you,” Arthur said. “I assure you that Fiona and I will set a date as soon as we’re able. I love your daughter, Mr. Quinn. I won’t rest until she becomes my wife.”
Her father finished his coffee and quickly excused himself, as if Arthur’s probes into his business affairs had scared him off. Arthur had won this round. But Fiona couldn’t stop trembling for an hour.
Chapter
26
A t first Fiona promised herself that she wouldn’t go to Arthur’s apartment again, but she couldn’t seem to stay away. They got into the habit of leaving the speakeasies early in the evening so they could spend a few hours at the apartment and Fiona could still return to the hotel at a decent hour. And each time she was with him, Fiona found it harder and harder to leave his bed. Her longing for Arthur grew greater each day. He was so tender, so loving. She wanted to remain in his arms forever. If only his wife would let him go.
Spring arrived, and the trees and flowers on the street where Arthur lived burst into bloom. Central Park, a few blocks away, seemed like paradise— so lush and green it reminded Fiona of Ireland. She hated returning to her apartment on the Lower East Side, but she was afraid to keep nagging Arthur by asking, “How much longer?”
As they lay in bed one Friday evening, listening to the rain beat against the window, Arthur turned to her and said, “Why don’t you move in here with me, Fiona? If you lived here all the time, we wouldn’t have to run back and forth anymore. Please?”
Fiona closed her eyes, imagining how wonderful it would be. She wouldn’t have to go back out in the rain tonight and walk from the hotel to the subway after Arthur dropped her off. She would
n’t have to ride the train across town, then walk four more blocks from the station to her tenement and sleep on a mattress in a cold room with no plumbing or electricity.
“I wish I could stay,” she said with a sigh. “If only your lawyer would hurry up with the divorce.”
“I’m tired of waiting for it to be final, aren’t you, Fiona? I want to start our new life together right now.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible.”
Arthur didn’t know that she worked in a hat shop all day, six days a week. He didn’t know that she daydreamed of the life they would have together as she fitted hats onto head blocks to steam them or as she cut hat patterns from brocade and felt. He didn’t know that she had a mother and eight sisters in Ireland, waiting for her to earn enough money so they could come to America, too.
“Why not?” he asked. “What’s stopping you from moving in?”
She thought of the parish church that she passed each day on her way to and from work—the church she could no longer go inside.
“For one thing, my father would disown me,” she said, “and then how would I afford to live? I have no money of my own. I’m dependent on him for everything.”
“Let me support you. I’ll gladly pay for the apartment and give you a generous living allowance to spend any way you want. I already feel as though you’re my wife. … You’re my life, Fiona! The only thing standing in our way is a piece of paper with my ex-wife’s signature on it.”
“Do you think she’ll sign it soon?”
“She’d probably sign it much sooner if she knew you were living here. And I’ll marry you the moment she does, I promise you. But I don’t want to lose you. I can see that your father is growing impatient with me. He wants to see you happily married, and I don’t blame him. I’m so afraid a younger, more handsome man will come along and steal you away—a man who is free to marry you.”
“I love you, Arthur. I don’t want another man.”
“Then, move in here. We can tell your father that we eloped—it’ll be true, soon enough. I can only stay here one or two nights a week, anyway, and the rest of the time this place will be all yours.”