“Fifty-one,” Rosa corrected her. “As of last night, fifty-one.”
Anna smiled at her. “—different places, asylums and child welfare agencies, individuals who might have some information. I hired a young man who was once a newsboy and is very well connected to ask questions. But we’ve had no positive responses.”
“Sixteen letters weren’t answered at all,” Rosa said in a low voice.
“Rosa keeps track of the correspondence,” Anna explained.
“You can read English?” Celestina asked, and Rosa sat up very straight. “I’m practicing every day. Auntie Margaret says I’m making excellent progress.”
“That she is,” Anna said.
Lia took hold of the conversation by telling Jack’s sisters about the stories they were hearing at bedtime. She got off her chair to act out part of The Boy Who Cried Wolf, so delighted with this opportunity to pass the story on that they had to laugh with her.
The little girl had managed something that had seemed to Anna too much to hope for: the tense expectation that radiated from Bambina let up and then disappeared. And another thing for which Anna was very thankful: the impromptu storytelling crowded out any questions that might have been coming her way about wedding plans.
? ? ?
LATER WHEN JACK walked her home, he said, “They are trying not to be impatient, but it’s hard to hold back the questions. My mother is just as bad; I get a letter almost every day.”
Anna’s life had always been busy. She could spend every waking hour at the hospital and never run out of things to do, and now there were two little girls, two missing brothers, Sophie’s wedding, Cap’s farewell, and the entire Mezzanotte clan, and the idea of her own wedding to juggle. And Jack.
“Do you belong to a lot of associations like the Italian Benevolent Society?”
He shrugged. “Two or three. When there are legal matters to deal with I’m often called in. There aren’t many lawyers in the city who speak Italian.”
Anna considered. The obvious question was, did he want to be that lawyer? He was not too old to read law, after all. But as forward thinking as Jack Mezzanotte might be, few men liked having their career choices challenged. Instead she said, “I should learn Italian.”
“It would be helpful.”
“If I can find the time.”
“You have a willing tutor right beside you.”
“We’ll never have a moment’s quiet time.”
Jack squeezed her hand. “Italian lessons can happen any time. Spontaneously.”
Anna was glad of a cool evening breeze on her cheeks. “On demand?”
“If there’s a room available, certainly. Or a suitable hotel.”
And here they were back at the original problem. Not for the first time she wondered what other people who had no place to be alone together did. The birthrate was evidence that such things happened constantly and everywhere, and not just between married people who shared a bed.
“What are you thinking?” he wanted to know.
Anna started out of her thoughts. “About privacy,” she said. “And the reason people rush into marriage.”
20
THREE DAYS LATER Jack said, “There’s something I wanted to tell you about.”
Anna looked up from the medical journal article she was reading. They were sitting in the garden while the girls played hide-and-seek. For once there were no other adults nearby.
She said, “I’m listening.”
“Where’s your aunt?”
Anna’s brows slanted down into a V shape. “Why?”
“Because I want to tell her about it too.”
“Staten Island?”
“No,” he said, vaguely irritated.
“We’re not going?”
“We will go, but that’s not what I want to talk to you about.”
“And when will that happen, the trip to Staten Island?”
He realized she was winding him up, and let out what he hoped would sound like a long-suffering sigh.
“Saturday, if you like.”
“It’s a long journey. At least a half day if the ferries are running on time.” She paused to study the binding of her journal. “I doubt we can get back at a reasonable hour. Are there hotels on Staten Island?”
Jack bit back a laugh. “We’d shock Sister Mary Augustin right out of her shoes.”
Anna’s face went slack with surprise.
“What?”
She sat up straighter. “I forgot to tell you about the letter I had from Mary Irene.” She recited it to the best of her memory. “There was an odd phrase,” she finished. “Something like she was reassigned to the Mother House where she can contemplate devotion to duty and detachment from self. What does it mean? Is she being punished?”
Jack said, “I don’t think they would see it that way. They are being protective.”
“Ah.” Anna sat back. “They are protecting her from her own curiosity and her talent—because she is talented, Jack. She has a natural affinity for medicine.”