Gravel crunched behind me when Dad pulled up on the side of the road and emerged from the car, carrying a shovel and a garbage bag. When he knelt next to me on the grassy verge and wiped my wet cheeks with the back of his sleeve, the clean scent of washing detergent muffled the other, awful odors.
His smile was warm as the sun emerging from a cloudbank. “Got room for one more member?”
Later, after sending me off for a long bath, he’d made us each one of his famous grilled cheese sandwiches and gently explained how maybe it wasn’t the best idea for me to go scraping animal guts off the highway.
Wiping my nose with the handkerchief Moira always thoughtfully tucked into our sleeves, I wondered if Dad was standing in our kitchen right now, wearing one of those same goofy aprons.
Or . . . I guess it’s Dad and Stella’s kitchen now.
The thought stung. I tried to tuck it back, but the truth was that the dissolution of my parents’ marriage had left me shaky, as if the ground beneath my feet had suddenly turned to thin glass.
If the obstacles between my mom and dad were insurmountable, what kind of chance did Bran and I have with all that stood in our way?
The carriage rocked as Doug hopped down to help Collum and several other men unhook the dead bony horse from its flat, hay-covered wagon. With grunts and a squeak of ropes, the road cleared enough for us to pull forward.
Blocks of ice melted in the warming air as we creaked past. Water flowed down the street in rivulets as the men heaved the animal’s corpse up onto the sidewalk. The boys reboarded, and with a snap of our driver’s whip, the carriage jolted forward. I turned away and swiped at my eyes, determined to look only forward. To survive whatever lay ahead and stop mourning for those things that were behind me now.
Chapter 18
A FEW BLOCKS LATER WE EMERGED ONTO THE WIDE, flat surface of Fifth Avenue, and the nineteenth-century New York City of my imagination spread out before us.
My fists loosened as the street opened up and the sky once again appeared. Despite the cold, small, scattered parks sprouted with the first hints of spring. The air, though hazy with smoke and other forms of pollution, became breathable. As poverty gave way to affluence, the mud and rough cobbles morphed into a smooth, concrete-like roadway.
“That there is macadam,” Mac said proudly, pointing out the window to the flat surface. “Invented by a Scotsman, you know.”
The green tint behind Phoebe’s freckles lessened as the coach’s horrible juddering smoothed and we cruised serenely down the wide, paved avenue. There was less traffic on the street. But along the swept sidewalks, hundreds of mostly well-dressed people meandered past. Women in sober day dresses walked arm in arm, gazing in shop windows. Men in tweed suits and bowler hats strolled by, newspapers tucked under their arms.
“Well, this is better, aye?” Mac took a deep breath, his grip on the coach’s open window loosening.
Doug’s upside-down face appeared in the window as he leaned down. “Everyone all right, then?” he asked, gaze locked on Phoebe.
When it became clear she still wasn’t speaking to him, I answered instead.
“We’re good. How much farther?”
Doug disappeared. Seconds later his voice drifted down, informing us we’d be pulling up in less than a minute.
Even though the journey had improved immensely, I breathed a sigh of relief. Between a dead horse and having the flesh shaken from our bones by the rough ride, I was ready for this part to be done.
“Waldorf Hotel!”
“Better put this on.” Phoebe brushed flakes of dust from the huge flower-laden hat. “A lady mustn’t be outdoors without a hat, you know. You’d take on too much notice.”
“Yeah,” I said, cramming the monstrosity on my head. “Thanks.”
The wheels ground to a halt. Outside, harnesses creaked as the horses stamped, likely as ready for a break as we were.
Collum leaned in, his serious face coated in dust as he murmured, “Everyone clear on their roles? Should we refresh one last time?”
When Doug and I nodded, Phoebe groaned.
“None of that, now,” Mac chided. “The lad’s right. I know ’tis old hat to you, m’ darlin’, but Hope and Doug here, they’re new at this. Only fair to go over it once more. To be safe, aye?” He gestured at me. “Hope?”
I had only met my father’s great-aunt Abagail once. His great-uncle’s wealthy widow had been gracious and lovely, and I’d fallen madly for her when I noticed how very much she intimidated my horrible grandmother. While introducing the rest of her blond, simpering brood, Mother Bea had pointedly ignored my presence. A true Southern lady from a very old and distinguished New Orleans family, the poised, soft-spoken Abagail Randolph Walton had put the bitter Mother Bea in her place with one raised finger.
“But, Beatrice,” she said in that honeyed drawl. “You failed to mention this lovely brunette flower in your garden. Matthew’s daughter, isn’t she? And what might your name be, ma chère?”
The rest of that day, Abagail kept me by her side, enthralling me with stories about her Garden Street home and some of her more eccentric neighbors. When we’d begun formulating our backstories for this journey, I dug into Abagail’s family history.
I channeled her now, ending my sentences on an up tilt as if each statement were a question.
“Why good sir, I am but poor lil’ old Hope Battiste Randolph? Of the Lafayette Parish Randolphs? My daddy’s too busy running for district judge to take me over the big water to be married? To the second son of the Earl of Airth over in Scotland? Of course, he’s nothing but a big ole douchebag who’s marrying me for my money. Didn’t even come himself. Sent his lawyer to get me?” I gestured at Mac in his tweeds. “How romantic.”
Phoebe snorted. “What a wank.”
Mac grinned. “Agreed. A common enough occurrence for this time though, even if our earl is fictional. Not likely to be an issue, and safer than naming a real man who someone might’ve met.”
“And you’re sure this Randolph has come and gone?” Collum asked. “This could go south fast if the fellow happens to be tucked away in his wee bed upstairs when we go waltzing in, claiming kin.”
I tamped down my irritation. I knew Collum was only being cautious. And unlike our previous sojourn into 1154, I was much less sure of myself in this particular place and era. Though I had, of course, studied American history, it’d never fascinated me the way European history did.
It took only an instant before the image of the Waldorf’s yellowed register, conjured by Moira’s research wizardry, pinged open inside my mind. There. Dated less than a year previously, the June 1894 signature of wealthy Louisiana sugar cane magnate Waldo T. Randolph—?Abagail’s great-great-grandfather—?glowed from the page.
“I’m positive,” I said. “And the man had eleven kids, so this should be perfect.”