The sunset glinted pink off the waters of Randolph pond as Ella knelt outside a maple grove, sharing crumbs with the geese eyeing her supper—fried peach pies and lemonade, compliments of Woody. Her lungs deflated, and she massaged her temples. She’d come to Woody’s “birthday party,” along with several of the street boys, to practice the English she’d learned so far. And here she was battling admiration for him.
As if his crafting birthday favors—folded-paper animals unique to each child—wasn’t endearing enough, his cathedral rescue last week brought a sigh each time she recalled him whispering Polski through the lattice. That voice … oh, so rich. Like the charred butter coating these fried pies he loved.
Every day since the confession box incident, he’d given her English lessons and shared food while driving her to work and back—he’d been studying, too, she could tell. A patient, affirming instructor, he taught her so much more than the language. In their “practice” conversations, she’d managed to glean information about the upper class, their speech, behavior, and customs.
Woody’s unmistakable attraction to her became both a blessing and a curse. Without his tutelage, her date with Mr. Leech and the upcoming Theodore ball would prove disastrous. She understood that now. But Woody offered no quarter in the charm department. Plus, he had a way with people—the street children especially—that drew her, unwilling as she was.
Mostly.
A few yards from her, Woody swung Musty onto his shoulders to view a bird’s nest. With the kids crowding around his legs—bashful Shoe Shine, take-charge Freckles, cheerful Newsie, and others—he switched from Polish to German, Italian to French, teaching them the English words for egg, nest, sky, and fly. Unashamed when he stumbled over a word and the boys corrected him, he learned as much as they. A born linguist.
He winked at her.
She flushed. Correction, a born flirt.
The smile fighting its way to her lips seemed enough to get him walking toward her through the dappled sunlight. Hefting Musty to the ground, he watched the boy hustle to his friends, then sank to the earth beside her.
Digging her fingers into the lawn, she kept her seat. Thus far, any kindness she’d shown he’d had to wheedle out of her—she treated him no better than a threat.
It was time she acted civil. After everything Woody had done for her, she could at least thank him with friendship. Besides, friendship might prove her best shield against his kindness. Forming an attachment with a poor man would result in heartbreak—or worse, distract her to the point she might consider abandoning her family for him.
She filled her lungs. Upon exhaling, she offered a friends-only smile.
After several moments returning her regard, he propped his wrist on his knee. “Tęsknisz za swoją rodzinę? Do you miss your family?”
Grief ricocheted through her. She shifted, the tears gathering too quickly to blink them away. She’d done well until now, not thinking of her kin until bedtime, when she could bathe in the sweet memories she left behind.
Before she reached her kerchief, Woody offered the one from his vest pocket.
“Dziękuję,” she said, then gave the English translation as agreed. “Th—thank you.”
Shaking his head, he said in Polski, “Don’t worry about practicing right now. I’m sorry to bring you pain.”
She breathed a “no” and waved away his apology, still dabbing her eyes. How mortifying, wilting in front of him like a squashed cabbage. “I haven’t talked about them … since I left.”
Anetka spoke little of the homeland and never about family, probably missing her own too much. No wonder Ella felt fond of Woody. He and Anetka were her sole friends in this country.
“My sister, brother, parents, and grandparents still live in Austrian-Poland. They plan to come here when … we earn the money.” She swallowed, trying not to appreciate the way the wind ruffled his hair and spread his shirtsleeves against his skin. He’d grown handsomer since yesterday, the rogue. How was he still walking about, unattached? Someone had better marry the man, and soon, for the sake of all female hearts everywhere—hers included.
No. She couldn’t think like that.
As his friend, she’d have to tell him about her mission, for both their sakes. Otherwise, one of them would get hurt.
She gathered her composure. “In my homeland, my family are starving tenant farmers. I had a brother die one winter when I was young.” Her voice broke despite her raised brows. “Without proper nutrition and no money for a doctor, he suffered a miserable, pitiful death.” She shut her eyes against Eryk’s memory, and her breath left her in a rush. “My mother sent me to America … to find a wealthy husband, so I can pay for the rest of the family to come here.”
At his low whistle, she looked at him. Rubbing a hand over his mouth, he blinked toward the lake. Was that disappointment lining his eyes? “You ah, have a candidate in mind?”
Why do you ask? “Mr. Leech is the only wealthy single man I’ve met so far.”
Woody hummed. “I’ve had dealings with the man. Wouldn’t advise it.”
“Then who would you recommend?” she asked, exasperation weighting her brows.
His forced chuckle grated her nerves. “I don’t want to meddle. But … you’d do well to … consider options other than Leech.”
After a full minute of her nibbling at the last of her pie and his pulling at a snag on his pants leg, she pounced on a safe subject. “Is your family nearby?”
He squinted into the fading sun, ears reddening. “They shut me out, years ago.”
Not so safe, then. “I’m sorry.”
A slow nod. “The first year was … dark. I didn’t come to know the Lord until later.”
Sensing raw pain behind the words, her heart hurt for the lonesome young man he must have been. When he offered nothing more, Ella brushed a crumb from her lip and gestured to the outline of the necklace beneath his shirt. “May I ask about the ring?”
After considering the piece, then her for a long moment, he retrieved the leather string and drew his finger over the silver band where two hands held a crowned heart. “Belonged to a friend. Her name was Molly. She’s passed away now.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“I think so.” He replaced the necklace, then smiled at the roaring and laughing going on behind her. The children charged a flock of geese, wielding sticks for swords and singing some type of battle march. Singing quite well, actually.
Smile fading, Woody said, “Thanks for your help today. They haven’t known a”—meeting her eyes, he faltered, cleared his throat—“motherly touch in a long time. You’re good with them.”
She held back her smile but couldn’t hold back her blush. She’d noticed he stumbled more when near her. “I’m only a student. Are there no girls?”
“I’m sorry?”
“On the streets. I never see girls with you.”
“Sadly, the girls learn early not to trust a man. Few men give gifts to street children without … expecting some type of favor in return. For the boys, maybe a theft, pick-pocketing or housebreaking. For the girls … it’s worse. The younger boys help me get food and blankets to them.”
Ella’s stomach rebelled at the circumstances he implied. She’d grown up safe from those kinds of dangers with Tata i Dziadunio, Father and Grandfather, there to guard her. These children had no one. Except Woody. “You’re a Godsend to them.”
After plucking a blade of grass, he twirled the shoot between his fingers. “I feel it’s my calling from God. I want to build an orphanage for them, a refuge and learning center, to teach them how to survive in America, and of course facilitate adoptions to good homes. So far, I haven’t gained much support.” He stared over the pond in the twilight and whispered, “Maybe the time isn’t right.”
Her hand settled on his. “God will help you find a way.”
His darkening gaze, his warmth, and the gentle lapping of the pond at their feet all descended on her heart in one fell swoop.
Before she could snatch her hand away, he folded it in his own. “Thank you, Ella Lipski. For having faith in me.”
Every heartbeat bloomed soft and new, but pain sprouted alongside. She lowered her lashes. No matter how hard she fought, she was falling for a man she couldn’t have.
Two weeks later, lantern in hand, Woody poked around the makeshift shelter his boys called home and refused to panic. His knees prickled, and his head throbbed, but by George he would not panic.
The boys’ once-cluttered shanty gaped bare and cold without the blankets he’d given them—no signs of life inside but the wallowed-out dirt.
Woody combed Morris Canal, tunneling fingers through his hair. The nearby swaying grasses and skeletal docks revealed nothing. They were kids. How far could they have gone?
After trudging back to his wagon, he drove by the usual hangouts and asked around town, but the boys hadn’t mentioned their leaving to anyone. Exhaling a pent-up breath, Woody debated going to ask Ella if she’d heard anything, but he couldn’t visit her apartment at this time of night without igniting gossip. He stopped his cart in an alley, his heart still galloping. Face-in-hand, he prayed, “You can see my boys, Lord. Help me find them.”
When no miracle surfaced, he pushed himself up and started the wagon forward, determined to overturn every grate in the city until he recovered them.
On his third drive through the restaurant district, rustling noises lured him to check behind DiMaggio’s Café. A boy dug through the ripe garbage barrels. Was that Oliver’s red hair?
Woody climbed from the wagon. With light from the kitchen shining on the rubbish, he kept to the shadows until he got close enough to speak. “Oliver, it’s Woody.”
A trash barrel spilled in the kid’s haste to get shed of him.
“Wait! Ollie.”
At the pet name, the boy slowed. Turned. His emotionless glare forced a shaft of pain through Woody’s heart.
They were back to this? Reeling inside, he managed one word. “Why?”
“We ain’t going to any orphanage.”
“What?”
“The lady and you talked at Randolph’s Pond about putting us in a orphanage didn’t you? So we voted to scram, soon as possible.”
The boys heard that? They’d kept silent on the drive back that night, but he figured they were worn out from playing. “We talked about a refuge … for all children who find themselves on the street. A place they’d learn English and how to get jobs and make a good life here. And they could be adopted if they wanted a family of their own.”
Oliver’s eyes flickered, but he didn’t move.
“Orphanages aren’t all bad.”
“You ever lived in one?”
“No, Ollie,” Woody said, suddenly weary. “No, I haven’t.”
“Then how do you know this … refuge will be any better than a workhouse?”
God give him strength. “Because I’ll operate it.”
Oliver relaxed a bit. “How you gonna babysit a bunch of kids all the time? Miss Ella gonna help you?”
Ella. After their pond conversation and subsequent lessons, he hoped she might care enough to get involved. But she had courtship on her mind now—he never inquired about her outings with other men, but at least he knew what he was up against. She planned to attend the upcoming Theodore ball and had put off further lessons until afterward. He’d talk to her then. “I haven’t asked. I hope so.”
The boy chewed his lip. “Me too.”
A deep place in Woody cracked and thawed. After much prayer, he’d had no divine revelation of a solution. He’d tried to dissuade Ella from pursuing wealth. Though if Ella was to be his, God would keep her from marrying anyone else and take care of the outcome. That’s all there was to it. He couldn’t picture Ella as high society. Candid and untouched by the elite’s coy games, she had a way of getting straight to the heart. She certainly got to his. Would she consider helping him—maybe rescuing girls as well as boys?
Oliver turned to go.
“Ollie.”
The small redhead stopped.
“Tell the other boys for me? I don’t want the little ones going hungry because of this.”
He shrugged. “I’ll do what I can.”
And so would Woody.
It was all Ella could do to keep from running away.
If someone had told her a month and a half ago she’d be in America wearing her employer’s dress in the woman’s own ballroom at the biggest social event of the season, she’d have doubted their sanity. Now, she doubted hers and resisted pinching herself on the grounds she might bruise—in this elegant ball gown, her arms showed. Thank goodness Anetka helped her alter the dress into something less recognizable.
Between two ferns and a vase, Ella crunched on a cucumber sandwich and took advantage of an enormous mirror she’d polished just this morning. Pretending to inspect her gloves for crumbs, she scouted the candlelit reflection for her employer, ever aware of jeopardizing her livelihood. Hundreds of guests floated about, offering witty comments and sipping punch while the orchestra played—a scene she thought she’d love—but the whole evening grew tedious.
Earlier a gaggle of socialites snubbed her when she couldn’t comment on Who’s Who and social politics, and her mind bugled a retreat.
But after the letter she received from Mama yesterday, failure wasn’t an option.
Ina was coming early. Forced to work sick in Baron Zimmer’s fields, she’d collapsed, and farmers of neighboring lands took pity, collectively loaning money for Ina’s passage to America. Life and death weighed on Ella’s success now, and she had trouble keeping her shoulders from bowing under the load.
The orchestra swelled into a familiar song, and her eyes slipped closed. Days ago, Woody guided her through the steps of this waltz, helping her brush up on the dance Grandfather—Dziadunio—taught her as a child. Ever the gentleman, Woody had laced his fingers with hers so she could feel the push and tug of his lead through his palms without his arms around her. Alone with him at the pond this time, she’d been most grateful for his consideration. But his eyes hadn’t behaved. They shone dark and warm and no doubt spied her feelings for him.
Over the past weeks, his rugged charm and relentless spirit had drawn up deep things from her heart, threatening her mission. At the same time, he provided the tools she needed to transform from Ella, the immigrant, into Marcella Elaine Lipski, tourist and ball guest of the Theodores.
She would never forget the brown-eyed rogue who welcomed her into his makeshift family and gave her so much more than the gift of communication. He’d given her a place to belong.
But now she’d have to say goodbye.
The waltz ended, and a dark suit drew close in the mirror. Jamieson Leech. Despite Woody’s warning, she’d seen nothing from Jamieson to make her reject his suit. Had Woody denounced Jamieson out of sheer jealousy?
As a married woman, with her own family, she’d soon have no time to think of Woody and “what ifs.”
“You look lovely this evening,” Jamieson said.
Ella gave her best effort at a smile.
On their several outings since the concert date, she’d grown uncomfortable when Jamieson kept reaching for her hand—nothing inappropriate. After all, she’d held Woody’s. Still …
Jamieson lifted his punch glass. “Care for some?”
“No, thank you.”
“Would you like to dance, then?”
The room took on a suffocating air as couples moved onto the dance floor. Her pulse quickened, drawing her hand to her throat. She’d never danced with any man but Grandfather. And Woody. But if she became Jamieson’s wife, what was a simple dance? He was handsome and considerate. And rich. What, then, set her on edge?
Were his eyes red-rimmed? He’d either lost sleep … or been drinking?
He hiccupped, pupils widening as he pressed a knuckle to his mouth. “Pardon.”
Heavens. She hesitated. “May we walk … outside?”
On their way to the veranda, they passed wall sconces with lamps she’d cleaned and wicks she’d trimmed. Satisfaction ran through her at a job well done. With bronze ceiling tiles gleaming above, wall tapestries adorning the perimeter, and light illuminating every mirror, the ballroom radiated the beauty of a fairy tale.
Jamieson pulled her hand into the crook of his arm and caressed her fingers in a way that made her grateful for her gloves.
Maybe not a fairy tale, but a dream. A strange, luxurious dream where the atmosphere and her gown lifted her spirits, but her task took all her fortitude.
Her escort stumbled over the threshold to the garden. He scowled at the ground, his slurred words hard to interpret. “They should have that fixed … certainly rich enough. You’d think they’d take pride in the grounds.”
Entering the garden on his elbow, Ella swallowed her last bit of hope. Would she marry a drunkard then? What choice had she? There was no time to “consider other options” with Ina arriving early.
Under a high rose trellis, she summoned her farm-girl grit and faced him with her best English—the question she’d been practicing. “Jamieson, have you never thought of taking a wife?”
“Perhaps I’ve never found a woman who captivates me as you do.” He cupped her face. The contact raised gooseflesh on her arms, his sour-punch breath wafting over her. “You’re so … exotic. Like a desert orchid.”
Captivates? Exotic? Orchid? Woody did not teach her those words.
Jamieson blinked, then took her arms.
Sensing his impending kiss, Ella closed her eyes and tried to envision Woody, but felt doubly wicked. This is what your family needs, Ella.
She called to memory little Eryk. For her siblings’ sake—
When Jamieson’s ill-aimed kiss glanced off her chin, Ella’s eyes flew open and she turned her head. Could she endure this as his wife, with a husband so inebriated he couldn’t properly show affection? She pushed against him, but his grip held her firm.
“So beautiful,” he slurred.
A chill raced down her spine as she struggled and stumbled backward. “You’re hurting me.”
Smattering her neck with kisses, he pressed her into the rose bush.
Thorns pierced her arm and back through her dress. “Przestań proszę!—Stop, please!”