Chapter Seventeen

Before she left London, Elena wanted to see Annamaria one more time, so she suggested that they take a walk in the park with Annamaria's daughter and Goliath, who David insisted go with them. She chose to meet her in Bloomsbury Square. It was not considered a particularly fashionable area by Polite Society, but she hoped Annamaria would feel more comfortable there. David had also insisted she bring a footman, Gerald, who was waiting at the carriage and looked to possibly be resting his eyes. Elena turned from Gerald with a grin on her face and vowed she would not tell on him.

It was a hot day, but the sun had gone behind the clouds, and there was a mild breeze, so Elena did not need her parasol to shield her eyes from the sun as she watched the little girl chase the dog. She glanced at Annamaria, whose wardrobe was very different from the threadbare gown and shawl she had seen before. In fact, Elena was reminded of Sophie, as Annamaria's blue and gray striped walking dress and jacket looked both practical and quietly elegant. She looked nothing like the woman with the matted blood in her hair and the swollen jaw she had first met. Elena looked down at her own floral yellow dress and bonnet with matching ribbon and marked to herself that she was finally wearing bright colors without guilt. As they sat on a bench, both of their gazes followed Evangelina, or Eva, chasing Goliath around a tree. He really was recovering quickly, and while Elena knew he was still compensating for his back leg, he moved with speed and strength. It must be all that food that mysteriously fell off her plate onto the floor for him. Suddenly, the little girl stumbled and pulled on Goliath's tail as the dog gave a short yelp.

"Will he hurt her? He looks like he could fell a grown man." Annamaria moved to rise.

"He will not hurt her." Elena could not explain her certainty, but somehow, she knew as she drew breath that Goliath would never ever hurt anyone who wasn't a threat to Elena. She and David hadn't even provided Goliath much guidance. There was something instinctual about his protectiveness. Just as this thought crossed her mind, Goliath had braced himself so the little girl, old enough to walk but not much more than a babe, could lean against him for support. Annamaria sat back down, hand over her chest.

"You found him on the street?" she asked.

"The very day I met you."

"My mama would say that was fate," Annamaria said with a faraway look in her eye.

Elena smiled as she thought of her village. "My grandmother was a firm believer in fate. In the Orthodox church, fate and forgiveness are paramount. I suppose that's part of why we have confession."

"Catholics, too." Elena could see Annamaria turn toward her out of the corner of her eye.

Elena had thought a great deal about forgiveness since her conversations with David after Anatole's message. Sometimes, she felt like she didn't know where to start, but then there would be days when she would find herself looking at her past actions in a different light, as something gone and far away. What that forgiveness?

"I wish forgiveness was paramount to my family," Annamaria murmured, her voice tinged with bitterness.

"Do they know about Eva?"

"My brother does. He came to see me once. After Dan was transported and I was on my own. I think he meant to take me back, but then he saw my figure. He called me a whore and left. I don't know if he told the rest of the family."

Elena took the young woman's hand. She felt the same fear that her family would reject her, but that fear faded more and more with time. Now, she would be happy just to know they were alive, even if they considered her fallen. Somehow, she felt in her bones that they would forgive her. Maybe she was coming to forgive herself if she could imagine that.

"Would it help if I wrote them? That we are friends and that you have a respectable position? I know some look down on me, but I am a baroness by some twist of fate."

"You would do that?"

"It's the least I can do." Elena shrugged, embarrassed by the difference in the current social statuses.

Annamaria turned her hand and squeezed Elena's. Despite her new position, Annamaria's hand was still skeletal, and her skin rough. Elena hoped, in a couple of months, now that Annamaria had a new place to stay and a new position, her fingers would be less bony and maybe covered in a bit of ink. The thought of ink-speckled hands, like David's when he sat all day in his study, suddenly warmed Elena. They eased into a comfortable silence for several minutes.

Watching Eva and Goliath play, Elena was struck by a sudden vision of a small child chasing Goliath. A child with her golden-brown hair and David's green eyes. She had not thought about children before David mentioned French letters the other night. She had started her courses a day or two later, so she had not thought much of it since then. Before, she had only considered children in the abstract, as to whether David wanted an heir, but never their actual child. Their family. She had agreed she wanted to wait until she heard news of her family's fate, but in this small park, she felt such a longing for that scene of a small child chasing a dog, with David sitting with his arm around her on the bench, laughing with them. What if it took years to hear anything about her family? Could she bear leaving this future for that one? That would not be fair to David to keep him in purgatory while she waited. And maybe it would not be fair to herself either. She loved the passion between them but had to admit that anything more still scared her. And yet, that romantic, reckless side of her was coming to care for him. She heard his words whispered in her ear. I love you, Elena. I love you so much. Stay with me. That reckless, romantic side wanted so badly to trust in such words. To believe in a possible future, in a life here with him. But she had such trouble trusting that side of herself. She had made castles in the air before, only to find they were smoke and ash. She would have to work on forgiving herself, to reconcile those two sides together, before she was ready to make any decisions.

"Do you regret it? Running away with a man?" Elena asked the other woman.

Annamaria took a long time to respond, continuing to watch her child as she spoke. "Yes and no. I suppose that is not an answer, but it is the best I have. I would never trade my time with Eva. I would do anything for her. She is my life and my blood. But I wish she could know her family. I wish they had not cast me out. That has been the very devil."

They both unconsciously crossed themselves.

"And the man, would you trade the time with him?"

Annamaria shifted, staring off at her daughter. "I don't know. It was the greatest and most passionate love I've ever known. But was it really love if he left when things got hard?"

"He did not leave, though. You said he was transported."

"Same difference. I told him not to go out that night, but he said we needed the money. He always said we needed the money."

"Would you like me to ask my husband to find out where he was sent? He might be able to find out through shipping or his friend in the Foreign Office—" Annamaria's body snapped rigidly, and Elena went quiet.

"I ought to know as his wife, but we never had the chance to marry before he was transported. We were supposed to elope that night, but I never saw him again. He always said we needed more money before we could marry. My last name isn't even O'Donnell. It's Marinetti." She turned away. "I shouldn't have told you that. Now I'm even more fallen in your eyes."

"My eyes try not to judge too harshly. We all do impulsive things when we are young and think ourselves in love. It can cost us a great many things." She tapped her scar gently, which drew Annamaria's eyes. Elena noticed that some of the rigidity left the young woman's face and shoulders. She wished Annamaria hadn't had to lie to her, but she understood why she did. Better to be the wife or widow of a transported man than an unwed mother in the eyes of society.

"Thank you for your offer, but I'd have to think about it." Annamaria sighed. "I have not yet decided what to tell Eva about her father. But you may write to my family if you so wish. My parents cannot read in English, but my brother can. The Marinettis of Clerkenwell. I can find the address somewhere, I'm sure."

Elena nodded. She decided she would write to them as soon as possible. Even if she could not put her own family back together, she could at least try to help Annamaria. They settled into another comfortable silence as Elena basked in her renewed purpose.

Suddenly, the light shifted, and Elena was overwhelmed by the sensation of being stuck in a bad dream, but she could not quite put her finger on what exactly made her feel that way. The scene around her was idyllic, the laughter and barking, the warm day. And yet she felt a whisper of something on the edge of her senses. She looked at the ground, at the grass. When she was alone in the world, shadows had always been her friend, telling her who or what was behind her without having to look around. The sun had returned, but the shadow on the ground in front of her was too large and too tall to be made by just herself and Annamaria sitting on the bench. As she gazed at the ground before her, Elena slowly realized that there was no longer a breeze, as if something was blocking the air behind her, and she froze, not daring to turn around. She willed Annamaria to look at her so she could catch her eye, but Annamaria was still watching Eva and Goliath. Goliath, who was running rapidly from a distance. Running toward them. Turn around. She felt the words as if someone had whispered them in a language she used to know. Her senses reeled from the eerily familiar scent of cloves she had never known in England. Turn around and face me. Goliath was barreling toward her at full speed, the child trying to keep up. Elena dared to look again at the shadow, but it receded. She turned slowly, and there was nothing behind them but air. Then she saw it. On the bench to her left were four daisies that looked freshly plucked. Her breath caught in her chest as she heard her grandmother's voice on the subject of flowers: an odd number of flowers are for the living. An even number are for the dead . There were likely very few in all of England who would know that superstition. It must be a coincidence. But it was a coincidence that she could not stop thinking about all the way home.