The Jane Club was wonderful, but it was an apartment building in a seedy section of town. And there were so many strangers in Chicago to visit the Fair—or to prey upon those who did. “Who would bring you back home when you’re done?”
“I’m sure I could find someone.”
But it didn’t feel right, especially after Rose had shown up to her violin lesson with bruises and smelling of cologne.
“Another time,” Sylvie said gently. “We’ll make arrangements to be sure you have a proper escort home afterwards, all right?” She could go with Rose herself this evening, if only to see her safely home afterward. She could stay at the coffeehouse around the corner from the Jane Club until it was time to pick Rose up and head home. But she was spent. All she wanted was a quiet evening.
To Tessa, Sylvie said, “Thank you so much for the offer. Rain check?”
“Of course, Miss Townsend. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I ought to be going.”
Sylvie bade her good-bye and waited for the door to close behind her.
“I’m sorry you’re disappointed,” she told Rose. She glanced at the bruise again, and Rose hid it behind her back. “I saw that.” The words slipped out before she could think to frame them better.
“Saw what?”
“The bruise. How did you come by it?”
“It’s nothing.” Rose looked at it. “I didn’t even notice it before now.”
“It looks like someone held you too firmly. What happened, dear?”
Rose shrugged. “I rode the Ice Railway this afternoon.”
“You what?” Sylvie had expressly forbidden her to board that rickety contraption.
“Hazel and her friends were all doing it. Walter was there, too. He said he’d ride with me to keep me safe and assured me you wouldn’t mind if you knew that.”
Sylvie had a soft spot for Meg’s oldest child, but she did mind being dismissed.
“We picked up a lot of speed, and on a curve I started to—well, I leaned out of the car unintentionally. Walter grabbed my wrist and yanked me back in. See? Nothing to worry about.”
Sylvie didn’t understand why the Ice Railway was still in operation after the accident two months ago that had killed a man and injured five others. But at least it explained the marks and why Rose had carried a hint of Walter’s cologne. Still, Sylvie couldn’t resist pointing out that this was exactly why she’d told Rose not to ride it in the first place.
Rose stood, fire sparking behind her eyes. “You have so many rules for me, Mimi.”
“Because I love you.”
“No, because you don’t trust me to make any decisions on my own, even though I finished school. My best friend got married this summer, my other friend left for Cornell University, and you’re still telling me what not to do. That doesn’t feel like love to me, it feels like a cage. But, in the words of Jane Eyre, ‘I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will . . .’”
Sylvie finished the quote in her mind: which I now exert to leave you.
“You misunderstand. There’s no need for—” She stopped herself before she would make things worse, pushing Rose away even further. She needed time to think things through. It was true that Rose had completed her schooling this past spring, but she was the youngest in her class. Too young to know yet what she wanted for her future.
Sylvie fiddled with the buttons on her cuffs. “I’d like to check the ledger before closing up here. Then I’ll come up and start working on dinner. We’ll talk more then.”
“Don’t bother.” Rose scooped up Tiny Tim and held him to her chest. “Suddenly I’m not hungry.”
Whatever fear Kristof had glimpsed in Gregor in Music Hall seemed to vanish once they began walking through the Midway Plaisance. Gregor had always been easily distracted, and nowhere on earth was there more to catch the eye than right here.
Violin cases in hand, they walked west, putting behind them the Fair’s manicured lawns, sculptured fountains, and neoclassical buildings of monumental scale. The World’s Columbian Exposition was a stately affair designed to awe, educate, and inspire. The Midway, a mile-long strip of park stretching inland from one of the Fair’s west entrances, was a rambunctious assault on the senses. By the looks of the crowd, they didn’t mind.
“We could catch the Houdini brothers if we hurry,” Gregor said. “Did you know they were born in Budapest?”
“Who?”
“They do this trick called Metamorphosis where Harry gets trussed up, tied in a sack, and locked in a trunk. A curtain is drawn and pulled back again, and quick as a wink, Harry is free and it’s his brother in the trunk!”
Mildly intrigued, Kristof mused that he would have given anything to trade places with his brother while they were growing up. “We’re not here for a magic show,” he said instead. They’d agreed to find dinner among the many options on the Midway on the condition that Gregor would tell him the truth behind his reaction to Maestro’s announcement. “German Village?” he suggested. A forest of half-timbered buildings reminiscent of Bavaria rose up on their right behind a gate.
Gregor waved a hand in dismissal. “How about something a little more exotic?” He pushed ahead in the crowd until smells of sauerkraut and beer gave way to pungent aromas of cooking meats, unusual spices—and camel and donkey dung. Cairo Street was up ahead, a towering minaret spiking the cloudless sky.
A line of people waited for a uniformed young man to shred their tickets in the turnstile and allow them past the eight-foot-high wall encasing the village of imported Egyptians. Fortune-telling, dancing, and donkey and camel rides were only a few of the attractions available. If they went inside, Kristof wouldn’t stand a chance of commanding Gregor’s attention.
“Not today.” Kristof steered Gregor around a hawker standing on two chairs outside the Persian concession, past the Eiffel Tower model, and into the shadow of Mr. Ferris’s wheel, the spectacular engineering feat that dwarfed the pride of Paris. Screams crescendoed and decrescendoed from thrill seekers riding the Ice Railway on the left. “We need somewhere we can talk.”
“We’re talking now.”
“Not nearly enough.”
Within three more blocks, they had passed the East India Bazaar, Austrian Village, Chinese Village and Theater, Dahomey Village, and more. “Here we are.”
Gregor squinted at the unassuming building at the end of the Midway, just beyond the Lapland Village. “Of all places. You can’t be serious, Kristof.”
“Aren’t I always?”
“Quite. Serious enough for the both of us.”
“One of us ought to be.” Kristof chuckled. “After you. No place like home, eh?”
He extended his hand for Gregor to enter the Hungarian Orpheum and Café. In truth, though they’d been born and raised in Budapest, it had been more than twenty years since he had called Hungary home. After studying music in Vienna and then in Naples, Italy, they’d played with symphonies across Europe before moving to New York and then to Chicago.
Inside the Orpheum, a large café was arranged in front of a concert stage. A young lady in a bright national folk costume approached them. A scarlet vest trimmed with gold braid covered her white shirtwaist. She spread her embroidered, ruffled apron in a curtsy and flashed a dimpled grin. Gregor charmed her with small talk in Hungarian as she seated them at a table near an open window.