Children of Liberty

by Paullina Simons

  “We could go sit in the tea house,” Harry said, “but you and I will be sitting in separate rooms.”

  “Oh.” She was morbidly embarrassed.

  “In this country men and women don’t sit down together in public places. Do they in Italy?”

  “Oh, absolutely, yes, of course,” Gina stammered, trying to fake being progressive. “My mother and father went out to Luigi’s twice a year …”

  He said nothing. She said nothing. Before he forgot his manners and pointed out the brutal difference between them and a married couple, Gina, her humiliation flush on her face, busied herself with fastidiously buttoning her coat. “We can walk,” Harry said, “if you like. I have an umbrella.”

  “No. I mean, yes. It—it will be fine.”

  He opened the station doors for her that led onto Causeway.

  Outside snow fell from the inky sky. “It’s perfectly wretched,” Harry said, taking her elbow before she tripped. “Get used to this. It’s going to be like this in New England until the thaw.”

  Personally she thought the thaw was already happening, since his palm was cupping her elbow. Perhaps if they had been on the South Pole, he would have taken her whole arm.

  The sidewalk was treacherous; she soon slipped on the freezing sleet. How in the world were they going to discuss anything when their lives were imperiled?

  “Here,” he said. “Please take my arm. It’ll be easier. I’ll never forgive myself if you fall and break something.”

  She tried not to catch her breath as she took his arm. He held the open umbrella over their heads. She walked gingerly next to him, holding up her skirt with her right hand and every once in a while slipping in the icy rain so she could tighten her hold on his forearm. It was dark and the streetlights were on, dancing gold in the white flakes.

  “Are you cold?”

  “No.”

  They walked slowly down Causeway in the direction of North End. She pretended she was being careful. Mill Creek was to the left of them, and many bundled-up men sat on milk crates ice fishing. The park around Mill Creek had benches, appealing in the summer perhaps but now covered with slush. She couldn’t believe her blessed good fortune to have these five minutes with him completely alone on a public street. She would have liked to talk about nothing at all, but simply after a silent meandering be escorted back to her platform, assisted onto the train, and then spend the eighty-minute ride reliving their walk in the snow.

  “So tell me what this is about.”

  Reverie broken. She swallowed. “Harry, if you could hear me out first please, and then let me know what you think. My English can’t sustain your questions.”

  “Withstand. Of course. I will say nothing.”

  “You know that my brother has dreams of opening his own restaurant.”

  “Do I know this?”

  “I thought you said you would say nothing.”

  “Excuse me.”

  “You do know this. We told you and Ben when we had dinner with you our first evening in America.”

  “You told us so many things that evening, and such a fine detail must have slipped my mind, especially since your brother was disinclined to speak to us directly.”

  “Harry.”

  “Excuse me.”

  “My brother works two jobs now, at a local tavern at night and in a sawmill during the day. My mother cleans houses and sews.”

  “What about you?”

  She didn’t want to tell him she had been forced by nuns and meddling mothers to attend school, because she thought that an association with high school would make her more child-like in his eyes. Adults worked. Children went to school. “I’m very busy with St. Vincent’s,” she said, rushing through her reply. “We are saving our money so we can get a mortgage from a bank to open a restaurant.”

  Harry cocked his head in approving assent under the umbrella. “But what is it that I can help you with?”

  “Ben mentioned that your family is in the property business.”

  “My father is a property developer, that is correct. But not me. I’m still at university.”

  “Yes, of course.” Children went to school. To kindergarten. Men went to university. “But soon you will be working with your father, yes? This is your last year of studies?”

  “Even you ask me this.” Harry took a breath deeper than he meant to. “I don’t know what my plans are yet.”

  “Right. But you are going to work with your father?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  Gina frowned, keeping a steady eye on the slick pavement. The snow was coming down heavier. She didn’t know what to make of this.

  “What can I do for your brother today?” asked Harry.

  “Ah. You probably don’t know this, since you don’t have the opportunity to analyze the Lawrence property market, but there are two wonderful places that are available for renovation.”

  “Right. I wouldn’t know this. I don’t even analyze the Barrington property market.”

  “One place is on Essex Street, in the middle of other restaurants, a wonderful location, very good for business, close to the mills. You remember how busy it was Saturdays?”

  “It was quite congested, yes.”

  “Exactly. The other is on Broadway across from the train station. That location would do big business for travelers. So I was thinking … if we acquire these two places and make them new, because one is now a florist and the other a knitting shop that just closed, but a knitting shop near a train station is not very useful, don’t you agree?”

  “Perhaps that explains its difficulties.”

  Gina shrugged. “I suppose. But how do you explain the closing of a florist in the middle of a busy shopping street?”

  “Too many florists? This one charges too much for flowers? The quality of the flowers is not good?”

  “I don’t think that’s it,” Gina said. “I think it is unlucky. But an Italian restaurant that serves inexpensive, well-prepared food …”

  “Will be more lucky?” finished Harry.

  “Yes!”

  “Well, what is it you want me to do, Gina?”

  “Here it is …” She was glad they were walking and she could keep her eyes on the road, not his face. “Harry—if you could somehow help my brother get a loan from a bank to acquire these two places, and then help us by making them into restaurants, the way your father makes those apartments in North End into, you know …”

  “Apartments?”

  “Yes. Just to get my brother started …” She didn’t finish.

  “You want me to provide the capital?”

  Now she looked up at him. “I promise you, we will not let you down. We will be successful and we’ll pay you back, with interest, and you will make money. Also,” she quickly went on before he interrupted her again and she lost the gist of what she needed to lay out before him, “you might be interested in becoming part owner of our establishment? Minority owner, of course. But then our success would become your success, and you would make money from us, which would help your business elsewhere. You told me your father liked to help local business …”

  “I didn’t say this to you,” Harry said gently.

  She felt him looking at her. She studied where she was stepping. “It must have been to Ben.”

  “You call Lawrence local business?”

  “It is a good business idea. And it would help my brother. Because no bank is going to give him money right now. He hasn’t been in this country long enough. He doesn’t have savings. He asked at First National Bank of Lawrence what it would take to get credit. They gave him a list of things so long, it depressed him for a week. He almost gave up.”

  He watched her thoughtfully. She tried not to blush or avert her gaze. “How do you know anything at all about business, Gina?”

  “From my father.” She smiled with open pride. “He had a barbershop in a very good part of Belpasso, right where all the bankers went to have their lunch and siesta in the aftern
oons. He advertised himself to be the quickest barber in town. In and out in under ten minutes or your haircut was free. In no time at all, he had to hire six helpers because he had more business than he could handle. Every day but one he closed by five o’clock so he could go home to his family. He was a good family man, my father.”

  “And a good barber,” said Harry.

  “Yes.” Gina was happy that Harry remembered. “He became known all over our town and even in nearby Catania as the Barber of Belpasso—all because he took over a newsagent that was one of four in the same area.”

  “Your father was wise.” Harry said. “And his daughter’s plan is not bad. I have to think about it. I have no money of my own, so if this is to work, I will have to go and discuss it with my father. And he may be stretched thin in other areas, and may have objections to this I can’t see because he is very good at business, while I’m just good at reading.”

  “I understand. Thank you for listening to me.”

  They were past Copp’s Hill Burying Ground when Harry gradually stopped walking. “Shall we go back? Any further and we’ll be in the harbor.”

  Regretfully she turned back. This time she walked even more slowly. She told him it was because she was tired.

  “Should I get us a carriage?”

  “No, no.” She sped up just enough so he wouldn’t offer to get them a carriage again.

  “I have one question, Gina.”

  She waited.

  “Your brother Salvo,” Harry asked, “he knows you’re here, of course?”

  “Oh, he thinks this is a very good idea.”

  “Not what I asked, but all right. I mention this,” Harry went on, “because I’ve met your brother. The most recent time was almost two months ago when Ben and I came to Lawrence to invite you to my house for Thanksgiving. He was too proud to accept our invitation for dinner. I’m just saying that a young man like that seems an unlikely candidate to accept help in procuring a loan.”

  “This is business,” said Gina quickly. “The other thing, maybe he thought it wasn’t business.”

  “The other thing wasn’t business. It was hospitality. Much easier to accept than money.”

  “Not for my brother.”

  “Really. Well, he must be quite a special young man.”

  “He is.”

  The weather had gotten worse, the snow was heavy. Under his umbrella they walked down Causeway. Even the ice fishermen had fled. He tightened his grip on her arm. She didn’t think this was the time to tell him she used to run barefoot up the jagged volcanic rock of Mount Etna. She was not born to fall on a flat paved street. It was constitutionally impossible. Instead she squeezed his arm, without words.

  He waited with her until the train came, helped her up to the landing, tipped his hat. “I’ll talk to my father, and I’ll be in touch,” he said, as the train started moving.

  Gina’s wish had come true. Having forgotten all the words they had spoken, she had eighty minutes on the trip back to Lawrence to recall nothing but the feel of his wool coat under her ungloved hand as she walked beside him in the falling snow, as if he were a gentleman and she were a lady.

  3

  The opportunity took months, but finally presented itself. It had been sleeting and in the lumberyards, sleet coupled with dirt made all surfaces hazardous for young women in their oilskin coats and boots. And this young woman was walking too quickly to get out of the weather, and she slipped and fell. Salvo happened to see it from the warehouse, and in an instant he was by her side helping her up. She seemed dazed and slightly embarrassed.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “I’m fine, thank you.” She waited for him to let go of her, which, when he got the message, he did with alacrity.

  “You could have really hurt yourself,” Salvo said.

  “I’ve fallen off horses,” she said. “This is nothing.” She glanced down at her mud-covered coat and boots and shook her head. “I am quite a mess, however. I will have to go clean myself up. Will you excuse me, please?”

  He offered her his arm. “Please, let me help you inside,” he said. His Italian accent sounded so heavy on him all of a sudden, and his third-hand and battered jacket so beggarly when in such proximity to her fine wool threads.

  “That won’t be necessary.” She scrutinized him. “What is your name?”

  “Salvatore Attaviano,” he said, lifting his hat. “All my friends call me Salvo.” He smiled, showing her the full set of his superb Sicilian teeth.

  She didn’t return his smile. “I’m Miss Porter, Mr. Attaviano. My father owns this lumberyard. And I’m fine. But thank you for your quick reflexes.” And without saying another word, Miss Porter walked off, just as quickly and incautiously as before, slipping and nearly falling twice more in the viscous wet mud before she made her way across the yard and inside the managers’ house.

  4

  Alice and Harry were having their customary Wednesday dinner at Alice’s home in Brookline. Usually her parents surrounded her, but tonight Harry had gotten to Brookline later than usual and Orville and Irma, after sitting with them for a half-hour, retired upstairs. Only Sheffield, the Porter’s butler, and Trieste, Alice’s personal maid, sat in the dining room with them. They were almost alone.

  “Why were you so late tonight, dear?” she asked after they had been served their soup and salad simultaneously to speed things up.

  “I got caught up in things,” he said. “And have you seen the weather? I saw three fallen horses on the way.”

  “I know, it’s ghastly.” She lightly tapped his arm before she took her knife. “I love it when you get caught up in things. It’s one more thing about you, darling, I find completely irresistible.”

  “How can I be that lucky?”

  “Because you’re adorable,” she said, leaning in slightly and kissing the air above his nose. “That’s why you’re that lucky. Even when you’re unpardonably late.”

  “Why is everyone being so accommodating to me recently?” he asked. “You, your parents?”

  She smiled. “Perhaps they’re being hopeful?” Before Harry got discomfited, she changed the subject to the first foolish thing that sprung to her lips. “Darling, did you hear about the two men who drowned not far from Barrington? Simply awful, isn’t it? Their poor families. In icy water, too.”

  “I think it probably doesn’t matter if the water is freezing or boiling,” Harry said, staring blankly into his roast mustard chicken. “How did it happen?”

  “No one knows. They were found in shallow, nearly frozen waters.”

  “Even more suspicious then. Sounds like murder.”

  “No, no. Nothing as exciting as that.” She sighed. “Didn’t you read the paper?”

  “I did. But I don’t read the gossip pages.”

  “This wasn’t in the gossip pages.”

  “I don’t read the obituaries either.”

  Alice suddenly stopped speaking and put down her utensils.

  “God—I’m terribly sorry,” she said, placing her hand over Harry’s. “That was so thoughtless of me.”

  Harry blinked, once, twice. “Don’t be silly. Tell me about some other horrible thing that’s happened. Though, you know, Esther and I get plenty of that from Elmore.” Harry forced a laugh, squeezing Alice’s fingers. “I think it’s one of the reasons Esther won’t reject him outright. She is titillated by his stories of hideous infections.”

  Alice tittered in surprise. “Your sister doesn’t seem to me the kind of woman who would be.”

  “Esther is surprising in many ways,” Harry said. “Are you ready for dessert?”

  Alice clapped. “Oh yes. I’m so glad you don’t have to rush off. Sheffield said the crème brûlée tonight is heavenly.”

  “How appropriate,” said Harry. “Because you’re heavenly.”

  They smiled at each other, sipped their wine, nuzzled the air in front of them.

  “The weather’s been horrid, hasn’t it?”
r />   “Demonic.”

  “I actually fell today. On flat ground.” She shook her head.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Fine. Nothing injured but my pride. It’s unheard of. Just proves how terrible the weather has been. I love our city,” Alice said, “but I do wish sometimes I lived in a place where it was a wee bit warmer. Don’t you?”

  Harry shrugged. “Never really thought about it,” he replied. “Like where? Greece or the South of France?” He paused. “Italy?”

  Alice became animated. “I meant more like out west. But you know I’ve always dreamed of traveling to Italy. The whole country sounds so delightful and romantic. And warm.”

  “Does it?”

  “Harry!” Alice laughed. “Why do you sound so far away, as if you’ve never even heard of Italy?”

  He smiled. “Unlike you, I’m so rarely outside, I barely notice the weather. Italy, Boston, all about the same.”

  “Do you see what I mean?” She gazed at him affectionately. “Completely irresistible. You don’t go outside because you’re always reading and writing, bent over a desk.”

  “I go outside sometimes,” Harry said. “I walk out of my front door and get into a carriage. But it brings me only so close to Gore Hall.”

  “Yes, that’s true, you do have to walk a little bit.” She stirred his tea. “I’m surprised you’re in as good a condition as you are, considering how little you move your body.”

  He rapped on his temple. “I’m moving in here,” he said. “Never stopping.”

  Crème-brûlée was indeed exquisite, the tea from India very aromatic. The after-dinner cognac warmed their throats, made Alice flushed and giggly and Harry less reticent than usual. They sat in the library while Sheffield stoked the fire every five minutes.

  Alice was slightly intoxicated and giggling.

  “What is he doing?” she whispered theatrically to Harry. “How much attention can a fire need?”

  They broke out into a fit of laughter which they tried to suppress.

  “We don’t want him to be titillated,” whispered Alice.

  “Of course not. Or do we?”

  Alice gasped in mock-horror. “Harry, what’s gotten into you, darling?”