Anyway, I promise I can stride along at a fairly fast clip if I’ve a mind to. But just now I suggested a walk to get us out from under the harridan’s beady gaze. I want to talk, Mollie. I love talking to you. Why don’t you want to talk to me?”
“But I do, Josh. Why would you think otherwise?”
“Stop it,” he said. “Stop playacting. It’s the very thing I liked about you from the first. That you’re genuine, at least mostly. But ever since we went coaching you’ve treated me like something with a bad smell you don’t want too close. Please tell me why that is, and what I have to do to get back to where we were. Where I thought we were,” he amended.
A crossroads and Mollie recognized it as such. “What did you mean . . . mostly genuine?”
“Popandropolos,” he said immediately, “is poppycock. A made-up name if ever I heard one. You’re Irish, though I have no idea why you prefer not to say so. I know the Irish aren’t held in high regard, but no one’s likely to mistake you for a Five Points doxy, Mollie Whoever. So why the masquerade? And, more important, why have you decided not to like me?”
“I do like you. I think you are charming and fun to be with. And very, very courageous.”
“Then why—Good Lord . . . Mollie, are you married after all? To some blighter who’s gone off and left you to fend for yourself? Someone named Popandropolos, perhaps?”
“No, nothing like that. I am not married, Josh. I give you my solemn word I’m not.”
“Fair enough. I accept it. But that still leaves the question of why you’ve been holding me at arm’s length for a month.”
Across from them a small girl with pink ribbons in her hair was rolling a hoop along the grass, and an even smaller boy was toddling into his father’s open arms. “Because,” Mollie said, “I am twenty-two and grown accustomed to being a spinster, and I don’t wish my peace to be disturbed by dreams that can’t come true.”
The sheer brutal honesty of it left him without a response for several long seconds. Then, finally, recognizing that he was wading into waters much deeper than he’d first intended to brave, “Why can’t your dreams come true, Mollie? How can you make that assumption without giving them a chance?”
She shook her head. “Some things have to be concluded on the body of evidence.”
“Spoken like a lawyer,” he said. “Was your father a lawyer, Mollie Whoever?”
“I don’t believe so.”
Josh cocked his head and studied her. “But you don’t know for sure. I think I begin to see some shape to this story. Are you a little bastard, sweet Mollie? Or should I say bastardess? Is that the big secret, the shame consigning you to spinsterhood?” And when she didn’t answer, “If so, you should know I’m exactly that. A bastard.”
“You’re not! Your father is the famous Dr. Nicholas Turner, and your mother was Carolina Devrey of the shipping Devreys.”
“Ah! I see you like me well enough to have done some investigating. I’m delighted. And it’s all true as far as it goes. But apparently you did not probe far enough into the dark and dreadful past. My mother and father weren’t married when I was born. And I was a six-year-old page at their wedding, that’s how brazen they were about it.”
Mollie waved his words away. “It’s an old story, Josh. No one cares about it anymore.”
“True enough. No one does. And whatever your story may be, no one—or at least no one named Joshua Turner—cares about it, either.”
The sun was beginning to disappear behind a row of stately linden trees and the air was quickly cooling. Above their heads a number of small birds flitted among the wooden houses erected for them when the park was established in 1847, each labeled in now-fading lettering as Custom House or Exchange. There was even one called Macy’s—because some wit had commented, in New York even the birds had to be occupied with business.
A breeze ruffled Mollie’s
“But I do, Josh. Why would you think otherwise?”
“Stop it,” he said. “Stop playacting. It’s the very thing I liked about you from the first. That you’re genuine, at least mostly. But ever since we went coaching you’ve treated me like something with a bad smell you don’t want too close. Please tell me why that is, and what I have to do to get back to where we were. Where I thought we were,” he amended.
A crossroads and Mollie recognized it as such. “What did you mean . . . mostly genuine?”
“Popandropolos,” he said immediately, “is poppycock. A made-up name if ever I heard one. You’re Irish, though I have no idea why you prefer not to say so. I know the Irish aren’t held in high regard, but no one’s likely to mistake you for a Five Points doxy, Mollie Whoever. So why the masquerade? And, more important, why have you decided not to like me?”
“I do like you. I think you are charming and fun to be with. And very, very courageous.”
“Then why—Good Lord . . . Mollie, are you married after all? To some blighter who’s gone off and left you to fend for yourself? Someone named Popandropolos, perhaps?”
“No, nothing like that. I am not married, Josh. I give you my solemn word I’m not.”
“Fair enough. I accept it. But that still leaves the question of why you’ve been holding me at arm’s length for a month.”
Across from them a small girl with pink ribbons in her hair was rolling a hoop along the grass, and an even smaller boy was toddling into his father’s open arms. “Because,” Mollie said, “I am twenty-two and grown accustomed to being a spinster, and I don’t wish my peace to be disturbed by dreams that can’t come true.”
The sheer brutal honesty of it left him without a response for several long seconds. Then, finally, recognizing that he was wading into waters much deeper than he’d first intended to brave, “Why can’t your dreams come true, Mollie? How can you make that assumption without giving them a chance?”
She shook her head. “Some things have to be concluded on the body of evidence.”
“Spoken like a lawyer,” he said. “Was your father a lawyer, Mollie Whoever?”
“I don’t believe so.”
Josh cocked his head and studied her. “But you don’t know for sure. I think I begin to see some shape to this story. Are you a little bastard, sweet Mollie? Or should I say bastardess? Is that the big secret, the shame consigning you to spinsterhood?” And when she didn’t answer, “If so, you should know I’m exactly that. A bastard.”
“You’re not! Your father is the famous Dr. Nicholas Turner, and your mother was Carolina Devrey of the shipping Devreys.”
“Ah! I see you like me well enough to have done some investigating. I’m delighted. And it’s all true as far as it goes. But apparently you did not probe far enough into the dark and dreadful past. My mother and father weren’t married when I was born. And I was a six-year-old page at their wedding, that’s how brazen they were about it.”
Mollie waved his words away. “It’s an old story, Josh. No one cares about it anymore.”
“True enough. No one does. And whatever your story may be, no one—or at least no one named Joshua Turner—cares about it, either.”
The sun was beginning to disappear behind a row of stately linden trees and the air was quickly cooling. Above their heads a number of small birds flitted among the wooden houses erected for them when the park was established in 1847, each labeled in now-fading lettering as Custom House or Exchange. There was even one called Macy’s—because some wit had commented, in New York even the birds had to be occupied with business.
A breeze ruffled Mollie’s
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