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NICO KISSED EACH OF his siblings, including a very reluctant Stefan and an even more annoyed Gino, before taking his small suitcase and walking away from his family’s apartment building, the heat of the day already dampening the curls along the back of his neck.
While he had mentioned Faith to his mother, he hadn’t had the nerve to talk about staying on in Newport to work with Mr. Travers, not when they had all enjoyed a long, lingering dinner of his mother’s sausage lasagna and Rosetta’s cream cake, made especially for his return.
How could he ask, then, for their blessing to be excused from his responsibility to them?
The train was surprisingly quiet, not as busy as usual, and left him to gaze out of the window at the variety of landscapes that flashed by, wondering how he could approach them.
As much as he loved the store and all that it entailed, his fascination with construction and design was going to distract him, and he wanted to find a way to reconcile the two.
If he could.
Please, God, show me the way, because I cannot see one.
When he closed his eyes, hoping to sleep a little to combat the tiredness that always came from rail travel, memories of Faith lit up in the back of his mind.
Not just her beauty, but the way she fearlessly spoke up when discussing plans with her uncle and cousin, even with a new male presence in the room.
She hadn’t been afraid of Nico, not of sharing her thoughts in a world where men took the lead and women were usually seen as intellectually inferior.
Nico, of course, had not been raised to believe this, and he also knew better. His mother and sisters could outwit any man, and their knowledge was hard-earned and practical.
Would Faith be glad to see him?
Had she thought of him as he had been thinking of her?
When he finally drifted off into a light sleep, the rocking of the train car lulling him into a dreamy twilight state, he imagined holding Faith’s hand as they walked on the Cliff Walk, laughing at the seagulls as they flew together in the sky in their perfect formations.
Once he was back in his hotel and washing the sweat and dirt of travel from his face and neck, he contemplated telephoning Mr. Travers. He would be back in the man’s home tomorrow morning, but he had the urge to speak to him now, about his hope of learning more from him, and he didn’t want that to take time away from the architect’s actual work.
Or his time with his niece and nephew.
There was a telephone in the hotel office, and as soon as Nico changed his clothes and felt a little cooler and more presentable, he wandered down, holding himself back from getting too excited.
This wasn’t a request that should be carried out other than in person, so he needed to request a time when they could speak alone to discuss it.
“Ah, good evening, Mr. d’Amici. You have a message here.”
A young man behind the desk with a tiny hat perched comically on his head smiled at Nico before he could ask to use the telephone, and Nico took the folded paper as he thanked him.
Family emergency, we will resume work on your plans the day after tomorrow.
It was signed William Travers.
Family emergency?
Nico knew he shouldn’t call now, but he wanted to more than he had before, if only to find out what this emergency might be.
And if Faith was well.
He had seen Mr. Travers’ youngest daughter often about the house, but he had never met the older girl, who was traveling but, if he had overheard correctly, would be returning to Newport soon.
Perhaps there had been a delay, or a problem with her travels.
But it didn’t seem like something Mr. Travers would call an emergency, or deem necessary to take a day off work to handle.
“Excuse me, sir. Did you take this call?”
The man who had given him the note shook his head, his smile faltering.
“I’m sorry, sir, but no, I didn’t. Is there a problem?”
Nico frowned. If he could find out how Mr. Travers had sounded on the telephone when he delivered this message, he might be able to discern the seriousness of it.
Instead of returning to his room, he decided to take a walk, but instead of heading south towards Mr. Travers’ home, he went east, to the Cliff Walk. He knew that taking it south would take him to Faith’s family home, and he would need to stop himself from going that far.
Although he wasn’t sure how far that would be.
The mansions along the Cliff Walk were of such a variety of style and size to make any architect’s head spin. No one had been worried about the congruence of design, with houses that looked like castles standing near others that looked like layers of cake, or Italian villas.
He would never know if he saw Faith’s home, since he didn’t know what style in which hers was created, and with his fascination for the differences in each home he encountered, he was able to distract himself from his concern for Faith and her family.
Until he saw three people, sitting close together, their hands entwined as they leaned on each other, pressed against the cliff’s edge.
They were far enough away that he could stop before they caught sight of him, but he was sure that they were too involved in whatever they were discussing to notice him.
But he could tell that the young lady was Faith, and one of the men at her side was her cousin Thomas.
She was staring out at the ocean, unsmiling, and Thomas had his face turned to watch her. The other man was easily a head and a half taller than Faith, but his forehead rested on his knees, his free hand on his light brown hair.
Nico couldn’t see their expressions clearly from such a distance, but he could see that they weren’t happy, and he fought the urge to move closer, to ask if he could help.
To see if there was some way to put a smile on Faith’s pretty face again.
Instead, he backed up, realizing that if any of them turned their gazes in his direction, he might be caught watching them.
He climbed over a rough spot on the walk and around a small curve, checking to be sure that he was out of sight as soon as he was on better footing again.
This family emergency must cut from Mr. Travers’ family to the Davenports’ as well, he thought, and if it was something that could take the light from Faith’s eyes, it must be something serious indeed.
By the time he reached his hotel, his stomach was rumbling, but he felt too exhausted to eat, thinking that his mother’s lasagna could carry him over for a few more hours even as his body told him something different.
When he pulled out a chair at the small desk in the hotel room, he fished out a sheet of paper and a pencil from the single long drawer under the top and sat down.
“Mama and Papa,” he wrote carefully, beginning a long explanation of his love for the buildings in Manhattan, for the family store, and his hope that there would be a way to reconcile the two in a manner that would not upset either of them.
He ended it with a promise to make no decision without speaking to them in person about it, but writing the words eased his mind a little. Now, the next time he saw them, they would expect to hold this conversation with him.
Unless they ignored it and hoped he would change his mind.
He would post it in the morning, and worry about how to spend the day after he got some sleep. Surely, all of this walking, along with the train ride, would have worn him out enough to make him sleep soundly.
But it didn’t, and in spite of his prayers for guidance, rest, and peace for Mr. Travers’ family as well as for Faith, he found himself tangled in the thin blanket that did little to interfere with the cool breeze that wafted in through the solitary window.
“I’m sorry for her, and that’s the truth.”
Nico woke from a fitful sleep to hear a girl speaking in the next room, her voice just loud enough for him to hear.
“Why don’t you catch the end of that sheet? You need to pull harder, Darla!”
Another feminine voice spoke more harshly, and Nico guessed she was responding to the first. Clearly, the maids were making their rounds tidying up the rooms, and that meant Nico had slept later than usual.
For all the good it did him, as he sat up with a roaring headache.
“You don’t know them like I do. They’re all good people, don’t let that big house fool you. Why, Miss Sarah taught my mother how to knit. You know my mother was an orphan, don’t you, and she was in a workhouse . . .”
“You talk too much, Darla! What if a guest heard you? You know we aren’t supposed to gossip.”
Nico frowned, tilting his head to be sure he heard them better. His mother would have something to say to him about attending to gossip.
But they were talking about the cottagers, and he suspected which ones they were.
“Never mind, because it isn’t gossip. It isn’t if it’s something good.”
The girl, Darla, had a point, Nico considered, slipping a clean white cotton shirt over his head, his attention on the girls’ voices.
“But it isn’t anything good, is it?”
The other girl sounded a little whiny, and Nico wondered if Darla was busy talking instead of working. But he silently urged her to continue, even as he knew it was wrong to eavesdrop.
“No, of course not. But I’m not saying anything wrong or mean about them, or especially her. Miss Josie is like a perfect angel, and Miss Faith is the same. They look like sisters. Once they both came to Friendship Hospital with baskets of blueberry muffins . . . those are my favorites . . .”
Nico didn’t care what muffins were Darla’s favorites, he only cared what she could share about the Davenport family.
The other girl hummed in agreement, easing away from her disapproval.
“At any rate, it’s a sad business, and I’m sorry for Miss Josie and her husband. Have you seen Johnny lately? He’s so tall. Everyone used to talk about how short he was, but he’s taller than anyone else. Handsome too.”
The girls’ voices faded, and Nico had the feeling it was devolving into a discussion of Faith’s brother’s physical appearance, which he didn’t need to hear.
But what were they talking about? What was this sad business Darla spoke of?
Tomorrow, he supposed, he would find out, but for today, he would have to find a way to keep himself busy and out of Mr. Travers’ way.