“Yes, I have a daughter of my own now, too.” I did not bother to mention that she was not truly mine. I instantly regretted it, though. The Norwegian community was small and Clara might know Ole Olson, and even if she did not, my sister could have told her the truth.
Clara’s gaze flickered a little—she was obviously well informed. “It’s nice, though, isn’t it, to have children?” Was that pity I heard in her voice?
“Nothing like it.” I held my ground, though anger and anguish were instantly there, filling my mouth with the taste of bile. I was about to say more but was interrupted by a man’s voice bellowing to be heard above the crowd:
“Hide the scissors, Bloody Bella is back!”
I turned my head in surprise and saw Arnold, one of the old gang from Milwaukee Avenue. He smelled as if this was his third day straight spending all his earnings at the beer garden. He came slumping down beside me on the bench, his red-brown beard streaked with filth. “What happened to that poor husband of yours? Did he get too close?”
“What do you mean by that?” I downed my beer and wished for another.
“Pay him no mind,” said Clara.
“Maybe he got a little close so you stabbed him like the other one.” The man laughed aloud, happy with his own poor jab.
“The ‘other one’ turned out all right.” Clara’s voice was calm. “His wound healed just fine. It’s nothing more to talk about.”
“Well, he died, didn’t he?” Arnold blew cigar smoke in my face.
“Not by her hand,” said Clara, and I felt the weight of the pewter button under my shirtwaist. Its pressure on my skin, like a kiss.
“He wasn’t good enough for you, was he?” The man was still laughing at my expense. I wanted to smash my glass in his face and see the shards slide in through his skin. I wanted to have him broken at my feet. I wished I were a man like James, who would not think twice of waiting for him in an alley with his blade sharp and ready. Perhaps if he was drunk enough—or someone had slipped something into his glass—maybe I could best him then.
Maybe I could crush him.
Clara smacked Arnold’s head across the table. “Of course he wasn’t good enough! He was a brute! You all are!”
“Well, what do you call her then, bloody scissors and all—?”
“A woman putting a fool in his place—and you should mind your place too, before she teaches you otherwise.”
“Oh, I would not dare touch Bloody Bella.” He looked at me. “Maybe you’d snip my balls off with those scissors.” Yes, I thought, maybe I would.
A kind look then from a stranger next to Clara, who had heard the whole exchange. He gave me a smile and lifted his glass. It calmed me, that smile, made me see reason.
“What balls?” I asked Arnold, and Clara laughed.
“I have them right here, would you like to see?” His speech was slurred as he moved his hands toward his crotch.
“That is enough of that.” The stranger rose from the bench. He was taller than any other man at the table, broad-shouldered and narrow-hipped. “I think you have outstayed your welcome. Maybe it’s time to go take a piss?”
“I’ll piss in my own sweet time,” Arnold answered, but the fire was all gone by then.
The stranger shrugged and sat back down. “Let the woman enjoy her glass in peace; she seems like no scissors-wielding fiend to me. If she did happen to stab a man, he probably deserved it.”
“He did! He did!” Clara shrieked beside him.
My tormentor muttered to himself. His gaze was unfocused as he stared into his beer, and a moment later, he lumbered off.
“Thank you.” I nodded to my savior.
“Don’t mention it.” He reached out his hand. “Peter Gunness.”
“Bella Sorensen.” I shook it. He was a handsome man, Peter Gunness, with blond hair and a neatly trimmed beard. His eyes were very blue. “You don’t live in Chicago, do you?”
“No.” He gave me a smile. Not a wicked one like James’s, but a nice and wholesome smile. “I came down from Minneapolis to see the fair. I have some work in the area.”
“Everyone suddenly does, it seems.”
He smiled. “You have a lovely city here. Maybe I’ll come for good someday.” His gaze lingered on mine just a little too long.
“That depends on the eyes who see, I think.” I gave him just a hint of a smile. I found I would not mind if he moved to Chicago.
“Is that an empty glass, Mrs. Sorensen? Do you want me to fill that up for you?” His eyebrow rose and his smile still lingered. He blew a little stray hair from his nose.
“If you like.” Who was I to say no to a free glass? Served by a handsome man, no less.
He still smiled when he rose from the bench. I watched him as he moved into the crowd, towering so tall above everyone else.
“He is a butcher.” Clara followed my gaze.
“Is that so?” I was intrigued.
“I believe his sausage is very good. Recently married, though. A shame.”
“How would you know about his sausage?”
She laughed. “Oh, no one really knows. He is picky, it seems, when it comes to customers.”
“Can never be too careful these days.”
“I wouldn’t mind standing in line for that one, though.” She glanced in the direction he had gone.
I shrugged. “He is a married man and we are married women.” But my heart raced a little in my chest, as if I were a hound who had just caught the scent of a fox.
“I heard his wife is sickly—could just be a rumor; no one knows for sure.”
“He seems a kind man.” I wetted my lips with the tip of my tongue.
Clara smiled sweetly and looked away when Peter Gunness came back. He handed me the glass and sat down next to me where the drunkard used to be, straddling the bench as if it were a horse.
“Well then, Mrs. Sorensen, I think it’s time you tell me all about yourself—and especially about those scissors,” he said.
“Of course.” I laughed, making merry of it all. It had been such a long time since that night, after all. The air was warm, the beer was strong, and the man was utterly charming.
When I closed my eyes, I thought I could smell a faint scent of blood coming off him.
19.
Nellie
Iam telling you, Nellie, your sister could not take her eyes off him!” Clara sat by the table in my new kitchen and regaled me with tales of the Midway and the fair. I had not gone as my back had been hopeless and made me walk with a limp—much like Olina back at St?rsetgjerdet. “Oh, you should have been there to see it,” Clara lamented. “It was quite the spectacle. She did not make much of a secret of her feelings.”
“Not so much feelings, I think,” I said, and made another stitch in the shirt in my lap. I had to give up the washing, but I still took in some mending. “She doesn’t know him at all, so it was maybe not the heart that spoke.” I added a wry smile, and rejoiced when I heard Clara’s laughter in reply. I still knew how to deliver a salty line.