small one.
"Ah. Foolish me. I thought you were on your way to meet your fiancé, not your husband. If you don't mind my asking, why doesn't the lucky bridegroom come get you himself? Most men would beat a quick path to New York to claim a bride as beautiful as you are. There are so few women in the mining country, and even fewer attractive ones. He must be a man with a great deal of self-restraint."
His easy flattery distracted her.
"He's never seen me." It just popped out. Her hand flew to her mouth as if trying to stuff the words back in. Franco had written to her that she must never tell.
Tonio's brow furrowed, followed almost instantly by a look of near amusement. "Ah, an infamous proxy wedding then. That explains it. The good man doesn't know what he's missing." He spoke softly, almost as if to himself.
Angelina remained mute, horrified she'd spilled her secret so easily.
Tonio filled the silence easily. "Who stood in for the groom?"
She didn't trust herself to speak.
Tonio answered his own question. "Some relative, no doubt. He signed his x on the dotted line for your husband, did he? You were hoping the validation of a marriage license would speed you through immigration? Fend off the licentious officials?"
She nodded. There was no sense denying it.
He studied her again, looking both sympathetic and incensed at the indignity of the immigration process at the same time. "Your husband should have gone to Italy to get you. He should never have let you travel alone. I would never let my sister—" He cut himself off. "Ah, but it's not my business."
Angelina still felt the need to defend her husband. "I wasn't alone. My escort, my husband's brother, was denied entry here in New York. Didn't Nonna tell you?"
"Ah, yes. The brother. Nonna did mention something." He paused. "So you want me to escort you to your husband so the two of you can go to the local priest and make the whole marriage right before God? You will make the marriage legal, won't you?"
Angelina couldn't decide what the correct answer was. Whether Tonio was mocking her or worried about the sanctity of her marriage. She didn't reply.
Tonio didn't press the matter. "What's your husband's name?"
"Franco Allessandro." She bit her lip. This wasn't going well, not at all as she expected. She was usually able to bend men to her will. But this man…
"Mr. Domani, Tonio, I have not heard from my husband since arriving in America and I am worried. Whatever you may think, it is not like him not to look after me. He is an old, dear friend of my papa. He would not leave me at the mercy of distant relatives if something was not wrong. I must get to him. Soon."
"Don't know him," Tonio continued as if he hadn't heard her. "You're Napolitane, aren't you?"
Angelina nodded, uncertain where he was heading with the question, but afraid he would not like her answer. He was obviously a northern Italian, and she, a southern girl. The animosity between the northern and southern Italians was very much like that between the Yankees and Southerners that she had heard about here in America.
"I thought so." He spoke slowly, as if weighing his thoughts in an unseen balance. "My grandmother came from Calabria, which explains my black hair and southern features. I can't tell you what a disability they posed growing up in Turin as I did. You must have noticed my King Emmanuel's Italian. I've never been able to effect a southern dialect worth a—" He stopped himself from using the obvious epithet.
The Northern Italians were responsible for the poverty of her southern Italian homeland. Because of the North's economic stronghold over the South, they held all the power and wielded it fiercely, taxing the poor beyond the humane. Crops had failed in the largely agricultural economy of the South for as many years as Angelina had been alive. There were no jobs, so the young men left to find work. No jobs, no men, and therefore, no husband for a poor girl like her with no dowry.
"Mrs. Allessandro, I have my reservations about taking you with me to—"
"Please. Don't let my being from the South influence you. I will be no trouble. None at all. As soon as we are on the train, I release you of any responsibility—"
He was shaking his head and laughing. "Would Nonna have sent you to me if she'd thought I was