“And how long will you be staying?”
“It’s open-ended at this point. Until I get what I’m after, I suppose.”
“Which is?”
“Oh no, let’s not do that one again. Ask me something else.”
“All right.” You dab prettily at your mouth, leaving a smear of garnet on your napkin. “How long have you been writing?”
My eyes are still riveted to your napkin, to the imprint of your mouth, and for a moment I find myself annoyingly flustered. It’s a simple question, perfectly safe. The kind of thing one might ask on a first date. I tell myself to breathe, to straighten up.
“I can’t remember a time when I didn’t,” I finally manage. “My father was a newspaperman and I wanted to be just like him when I grew up. When I was ten, he set up a small desk for me in his office and gave me one of his old typewriters, a great, shiny black thing I still use today. It was the same machine Hemingway wrote on. My father was an enormous fan. I would sit there for hours, banging away at nonsense. When I finished, he would read what I’d written, marking it up with his pencil, making notes in the margins: Stronger verbs. Less shilly-shallying with descriptors. Tell them what’s important and leave out the rest. He was my first editor and a lover of the dear old colonies, as he called them. Which is probably the real reason I’m here. He loved New York and always made it sound so wonderful.”
“I suppose he’s terribly proud of you.”
“He’s dead, I’m afraid. Almost ten years now. But I’d like to think he was.”
Your eyes go soft. “I’m sorry.”
It’s the pat answer when someone mentions a death, the polite answer, but the catch in your voice tells me you mean it. And then I remember Goldie telling me that you lost your mother at a young age. A prolonged illness, I can’t remember what. I only recall that she died in some private hospital upstate. It was one of those bits you simply file away, in case you need it at some point for background, but I never connected the death to a flesh-and-blood person, because you weren’t flesh and blood then. Now, with you sitting so close our elbows occasionally brush, the story registers quite differently.
“Thank you. That’s very kind of you.”
“And your mother? Is she . . .”
“Still alive but back in Berkshire, I’m afraid. I’d hoped she’d come over with me, but my father’s buried in the churchyard in Cookham and she refused to leave him. Stubborn as a goat—which is exactly what she used to say about my father. They were cut from the same cloth, those two. A match made in heaven, if you believe in that sort of thing.”
“And do you?”
Your face gives nothing away, but there’s a hint of sadness in the question, a whiff of resignation you can’t quite hide. I manage a smile, though it feels like an apology. “I’ve seen it firsthand, so I suppose I must. But I’m not the one who’s just gotten myself engaged. The more pertinent question is, Do you?”
You’re spared having to answer when a server appears to clear our plates and deliver the next course. I sip my wine as dishes are whisked away and replaced with new ones. I’ve been rather free with my talk, I realize, allowing personal details to creep in where they have no business. I’m seldom careless, especially with a thing as perilous as the truth, but you have a strange effect on me. You make me forget what I’m about—and why I’m about it.
Through most of the next course, you chat with your other neighbor—a railroad man named Brady with whom I spoke briefly during cocktails. I pretend to focus on the bloody cut of beef on my plate as I eavesdrop on the discussion unfolding across the table, a hearty endorsement for Charles Lindbergh—or Lucky Lindy, as he’s now called—and his strident assertion that Hitler’s brutality in Europe has nothing to do with the United States. A theme seems to be emerging.
You eventually push your untouched plate away and turn to me, picking up the conversation where we left it. “I’ve never met a writer before. Tell me more about your work.”
“What would you like to know?”
“Are you working on a story now? One about an adventurous Brit, perhaps, who travels across the big blue ocean to learn all about the glamorous Americans?”
“Yes,” I tell you, because it’s exactly what I’ve come to write. But it isn’t the whole truth. The whole truth you will find out later, but by then, the damage will be done. Time to pivot before you become too curious. “And now it’s my turn to ask a question. A little birdie told me you recently acquired several horses from Ireland. Is this an interest of your own, or is it to do with your intended’s love of all things equine?”
“This birdie—is she here with you this evening?”
“I never said the birdie was a she, but yes.”
Your eyes flick to the opposite end of the table, where Goldie is snickering at whatever your fiancé has just said. You let your gaze linger, thoughtful, discreet. When you finally look at me again, the corners of your mouth are tilted up, lending you a faintly feline appearance. “She doesn’t mind my name coming up during your . . . pillow talk?”
I shrug for effect. “She’s not especially territorial, at least not where I’m concerned. She doesn’t mind that I’m curious about you.”
“Am I going to be part of your story, then? Is that why you’ve turned up twice now? To study the modern American female and then write about your observations?”
I regard you from behind my wineglass, head tipped to one side. “Would you fancy being written about in that way? A two-page spread complete with photos—A Day in the Life of an American Heiress?”
Your eyes flash a warning, on the off chance that my question isn’t hypothetical. “I don’t fancy being written about in any way.”
I offer another one of my disarming smiles. “You need have no fear. I prefer to leave that sort of thing to your Mr. Winchell. He’s better at it than I could ever be. I’m genuinely curious about the horses, though. You don’t seem like the stable type to me.”
You arch a brow. “Don’t I?”
“No.”
“What type do I seem?”
You’re flirting with me, deploying that voice and those smoky amber eyes in a way your fiancé is meant to notice. Giving him a little of his own back. I’m happy to play along. Only I wonder if you’re up for such a grown-up game.
“I don’t know yet,” I answer truthfully. “I can’t quite get round you. But I will—eventually.”
You blink at me, surprised by my bluntness. “Are you always so sure of yourself?”
“Not always. But sometimes I look at a puzzle and already know where all the pieces go.”
“I see. I’m a puzzle now.”