Unfinished (Historical Fiction) - By Harper Alibeck Page 0,40
said, snatching it from her father's hand. The two men exchanged a glance she didn't understand, followed by a more perplexing nod from Stone to Reed.
“Good to see you, too, Lilith,” Reed answered in measured tones.
“Oh, I never said it was good to see you, Jack,” she chided. “I was just noting that father must have something really evil cooked up if he's hired you back.”
“Lilith,” her father growled, the thin membrane that held his temper at bay as fragile as a spider web. Irritating him amused her, yet he refused to look her in the eye.
"Enjoy your meeting, gentlemen. And you, Mr. Reed -- no need to bill my father any longer for your research into disinheriting me." Giggles of pure joy tapered off as she ran out into the bright sunshine, headed toward her future, to be tapped out in Morse Code.
"Señor! Señor!" Marcos screamed up to James' window, the sun shining in thin rays through tattered curtains. He groaned and reached for his watch, a luxury he'd indulged in when the first payment had arrived. It read 7:39 a.m.
"What?" he shouted back.
"Telegrafo!"
James leaped to his feet. Three days of agony. Three days of waiting and guessing and yearning and hoping, assuming and pining and cursing.
Now it would all end, and the hope and joy that coursed through his veins made the actual slip of paper an afterthought.
He threw on his pants, half-tucked in a stinky, wrinkled shirt from two days before, and shoved his feet into his new, properly-fitting, shoes.
Then he ran like a street boy, with glee and mischief, the four blocks to the telegraph office.
"Hello! You have a telegraph for me!" he puffed in poorly-executed Spanish, winded by happiness and the run.
The clerk, a new worker, nodded gravely. Oh -- that changed James' mood. What if she'd said no?
Never. Impossible.
As if walking through a vat of tar, the clerk slowly ambled behind the counter, then to a small mailbox, and pulled out a piece of paper. He returned, each step an excruciating obstacle between James and Lilith, until finally he handed the paper to James.
Nearly shredding it open, James stopped.
Outside would be better.
Trembling hands made the task harder.
And then the words. They were not real. No.
No.
She’d said no.
The message read:
No. I cannot accept. We are too different and this is no life for me.
And that was the last cogent moment for James for six weeks as his world went black and cruel as the caves in which he'd found his fortune.
Chapter Eleven
THE HEELS OF HER BUTTONED BOOTS caught in the crevices between cobblestones as she click-clacked her way down an unnamed street. Her dress felt like a vice, and although she increased her pace, she felt as if she were walking through water, her feet clawing the rocky bottom of a clear lake. She reached up to check her hat and adjust the pin, the feather damp and limp now as the fine mist slowly turned to a full deluge, the incongruity of bright sunshine and sheets of rain giving the stone-lined street with its row houses and gas lamps the feel of an impressionist painting.
What a long few weeks. First, she'd sent her acceptance to James. Then she'd borrowed money from Esther, who eagerly lent the money, calling it “The John Stone Comeuppance Scholarship,” and booked a train to California, terrified after the Titanic incident the previous year, yet ever determined. Living on Beacon Hill without James was a kind of death already. If the fates were against her, she'd sooner drown trying.
Although she'd been home for a week before leaving, James had never replied. That troubled her, but she had his offer and would travel on faith and steam power. She needed little else, and had packed as such, carrying only one large suitcase. Father could send her things later.
Now, the end of a long journey was but minutes away.
Spine stiff and straight, she walked faster, cursing herself for failing to bring an umbrella but tucking the thought away in the back of her mind. A slight smile played on her lips as she thought of him and she willed her tiny feet to walk faster, each step closing the gap of thousands of miles, a journey she'd begun weeks before. The long buildings sectioned into row houses with differing facades, some a pale stone with black iron detailing and others with painted wood exteriors, offered no asylum from nature's wrath.
She would appear before him with the countenance of a drenched match girl.