“We are envisioning a huge, open park,” Caroline said. “It can be used in inaugural ceremonies or big festivals. We’ll build a national archive and museums all along the mall. We’ll plant an alleyway of American elm trees on both sides of the park. Someday those trees will form a shaded avenue as people walk all the way from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial.”
The excitement in her voice was contagious. The vision she painted would be a celebration of American culture and history. Monuments would pay homage to their greatest heroes, and Caroline could help sell the idea to a skeptical public.
Although Caroline had once been his partner in mischief when they were growing up, she had become a sophisticated woman and had spent almost two years as the social secretary for the first lady of the United States. That came to an abrupt end with President McKinley’s assassination last September, but during those two years, Caroline became one of the most well-connected people in the city. She knew where the bad blood lay, how to flatter intransigent congressmen, and whose door to knock on for a favor. In the coming years, her insight would be priceless in helping the McMillan Commission navigate a political minefield and orchestrate a new plan for the city.
“How are you going to pay for it?” he asked.
“That’s still in the works. But the new mall will be—”
“Not good enough,” Luke interrupted. “The first thing you need to do is come up with a better answer to that question because it will be your biggest stumbling block. The other problem is that Washington has plenty of calcified elected officials who don’t like change. Take the B&P Railroad Station. They like it because it’s only three blocks from the Capitol, but your proposed new station is twice as far.”
“Six blocks isn’t that far,” she said defensively.
Sleet started falling, and they hurried to a nearby gazebo for shelter. Looking at the expanse of barren trees and waterlogged soil made it hard to imagine the future. The McMillan Plan, even if it passed Congress, would take decades to transform this mishmash of old buildings and chopped-up parkland.
The sleet turned into rain, and neither of them had brought an umbrella, so they were trapped in the gazebo because Caroline refused to put her new cloak in danger. Luke joined her on the bench and encouraged her to talk about her upcoming wedding, even though he’d rather have a tooth pulled than contemplate his dazzling sister’s marriage to the fastidiously sober Nathaniel Trask. She’d fallen in love with the Secret Service officer when they were both working in the White House. Gray was thrilled that Caroline had found such a responsible man to marry, but Luke dreaded losing his best friend and chief confidant.
It was a perfect example of his selfishness. He loved Caroline more than anyone on earth, but he dreaded the prospect of her marriage. What kind of howling void lurked in his soul to make him resent Caroline’s happiness? He didn’t like anything about the man she was going to marry. Nathaniel seemed completely wrong for her, but was it any odder than a Delacroix falling for a Magruder?
He turned to Caroline in curiosity. “Was Nathaniel off-limits when the two of you were working in the White House?”
“There were never any rules keeping us apart,” she said with a cheerful shrug. “His natural fustiness kept him at arm’s distance from me.”
He nudged her with his elbow. “You’re doing a terrible job of convincing me he’s the right man for you.”
“Was that what I was supposed to do?”
“It would help. I have no idea why you’re marrying such a stick-in-the-mud.”
Her laughter rippled out over the gloomy landscape like a ray of gilded sunshine. “Oh, darling, don’t you understand that there is something deep inside every woman that longs for a courageous, steady man she can’t intimidate? Nathaniel has my back. He is my foundation. We seem like complete opposites, but we fly together in tandem.”
We fly together in tandem. It was how he felt about Marianne. He barely knew her, but their spontaneous attraction was dangerous.
Then again, Luke had always loved flirting with danger.
Seven
Marianne struggled with a niggling sense of guilt for agreeing to let Luke accompany her to the DC Jail. Her father had suggested it would be best if she didn’t see Luke again, but he hadn’t actually forbidden it. She and Luke would visit the prison, take some photographs, then go their separate ways. She would forever remember him fondly. Someday this friendly interlude might even serve as a stepping-stone to lowering tensions between their families.
She arrived at the streetcar stop and leaned her tripod against the bench. The lighting inside the jail would be poor, requiring a longer exposure time and the use of a tripod. She adjusted the sit of her hat, wishing the weather would have let her wear something prettier than this plain knitted cap for warmth.
The streetcar was headed her way, and Luke still wasn’t there. She bit her lip. Should she proceed to the jail without him? Perhaps he had reconsidered the risk in seeing her and decided not to come. The streetcar began to slow and she stood, glancing down the avenue in hope of seeing Luke madly running this way, but she couldn’t afford to wait another twenty minutes for the next streetcar. She gathered up her camera case and tripod, ready to board.
The streetcar door opened, and Luke was standing in the entrance. “Hello, Marianne.”
She smiled in relief, kicking herself for doubting him. “Good afternoon, Luke,” she said as she boarded.
She liked saying his name. She liked the gentlemanly way he carried her tripod and found them both a seat near the rear of the streetcar. She especially liked the smile he sent her the moment they were seated. The streetcar set off toward the next stop while she gazed into his eyes. He looked vibrant and lively even though he was three days into the poison experiment.
“How are you feeling?” she asked.
He didn’t need any clarification as to what she was driving at. “Okay,” he said without much conviction. “I still don’t know if I’m in the control group or not.”
“Good,” she said, because it seemed the polite thing to say. Both groups would surely be fine, but she didn’t want to argue about chemical preservatives. “Thank you for taking time away from your work to accompany me today.”
“The good thing about my job is that I get to set my own hours,” he said, and she realized she had no idea what he did for a living. “I’m a journalist,” he explained in response to her question. “I’m in the process of creating a Washington bureau for Modern Century magazine.”
She wrinkled her nose. “My father hates that magazine.” She immediately bit her tongue, regretting bringing Clyde into the conversation, but Luke merely laughed.
“That does not surprise me,” he said good-naturedly.
“What kind of magazine is it? Modern Century is forbidden reading in our house.”
He described the magazine, and she could understand why her father disapproved. It sounded like the kind of rabble-rousing Clyde hated, but she liked the way Luke spoke about Cornelius Newman, the magazine’s editor. It almost sounded like he had a hero-worship for the elderly man who had been tackling unpopular causes for decades.