1
AT the start of the new century, Gina wrote Harry a letter. She didn’t ask Salvo about it, she didn’t ask her mother, and she didn’t ask Angela. She didn’t even ask Verity about it, who was busy with church and school. Gina tried to leave the letter mysterious, yet impersonal enough that if it were intercepted, she could defend sending it by the sheer professional dullness of its content. She remembered glancing at only one or two worthwhile tidbits in that 1838 tome of nonsense she had tossed aside. One said, never, ever, write to a man. But if you absolutely must write to a man, never ever commit to paper anything you would not want published in the evening tabloid with your name above it.
Dear Harry,
I hope this letter finds you well. I have a proposal of a business nature I would like to discuss with you on behalf of my family. Is there an opportunity for us to meet sometime in the near future so I can present to you my idea of a business venture?
I look forward to hearing from you.
Yours sincerely,
Gina Attaviano
She kept it as formal as she could, hoping he would respond in kind.
“Harry, who in the world is sending you letters?” Esther wanted to know after he finished reading it.
“A man about a horse,” replied Harry, stuffing the missive into his breast pocket.
She waved him off. “Seriously, who is it from?”
“Do you feel strongly that this concerns you?”
“I feel strongly that it does, yes.”
“Well, do you want to know what concerns me?”
“Not until you answer my question.”
“What concerns me,” Harry continued, “is Elmore, whom I find all too frequently at the front door of this house, pretending to make house calls.”
Esther flushed. “He is not pretending to make house calls.”
“Oh? Is someone actually sick then?”
“He is just visiting. Who is the letter from?”
“It’s from a man who wants to sell me a horse, Esther,” Harry replied, going on without pause, “because you’re aware, aren’t you, that residency students who are not yet certified by the board are not allowed by law to make house calls?”
“He is not making house calls! This conversation is over,” Esther said, bustling out, even the crinoline in her smart skirt starchly prickling.
Harry laughed. But he was aware that he didn’t tell her who the letter was from. He didn’t want to unpack the reasons why. Harry suspected Esther would think it was untoward to meet Gina to discuss anything, and Harry didn’t feel like defending himself or explaining. He spent enough time explaining himself to his father in ways big and small; he didn’t want to be flanked by his sister as well, who tended for all her propriety to blow things out of all proportion, perhaps because her outward life was so still and calm.
But also—and it was a small but significant also—Harry was afraid that Esther might mention it to Ben, as a mere aside, the way she casually mentioned the worst of things at Sunday dinners—it was a genetic family flaw—and what if Ben didn’t think it was quite so insignificant? Harry didn’t want to explain himself to Ben either, nor to hurt his friend’s feelings for a silly trifle. If it was important, he would of course tell him, but because it was superficial but potentially hurtful, he kept the letter to himself, first in his breast pocket and then locked in his personal cabinet in his room.
Dear Gina,
I don’t know if I can help you with your business proposal, I am tied up in personal and professional projects that take up the bulk of my time. However, not wanting to thwart a successful idea, would it be possible for you to come to Boston in the next two weeks? I have some time on Tuesdays between two and four, and Wednesdays between four and seven. I can meet your train at the North Street station if you can let me know what time you will be arriving.
Yours sincerely,
Harry Barrington
Dear Harry,
Can we meet next Wednesday? I will take the 4:15 and be at North Station by 6:00 in the evening.
Gina
2
She sat at her lessons on Wednesday paying even less attention than usual, if that were possible. She faked not feeling well, and at the end of her classes, stepped into St. Vincent’s, and immediately informed the nuns that she was feeling faint and would not be able to spin tonight. She was going to go home and lie down. She changed out of her school uniform in the closet in the vestibule, stuffed the uniform into her ragtag bag, and ran down Haverhill and across Broadway to the train station.
The thirty-mile journey to Boston took eighty minutes—the longest eighty minutes of her life. The oceanic crossing from Naples to Boston felt like a summer night compared to the endless clang of the crawling caboose. She was jittery, mostly because she knew she had to stay calm to get Harry to take her seriously and, being Italian and always gesticulating with her hands and being overly expressive with her face, she didn’t know if she could do that, stay calm enough for him to take her seriously. She was dressed deliberately dowdy: she wore her hair up in a severe bun, like Ben’s widowed aunt, whom she had met a few times at Old South. She had on a dark, puritanical skirt that covered a foot of ground around her shoes, and a long-sleeved, high-necked, no-frills dark blouse—a monastic uniform. From the nuns she learned, at least outwardly, how to keep the mask of decorum. She wanted to appear businesslike, not too lively. Her shoes were sensible and low-heeled and in any case invisible. She didn’t borrow anything shiny from Angela, not like last summer when she served lemonade and procured signatures for clearing tropical swampland while jangling silvery bracelets from her tanned slender wrists in front of Harry’s perspiring face. She scrubbed her skin and nails. If someone were to see them on the street, she wanted to remain without reproach. Not a smidgen of impropriety must pass between them. She tried to comport herself like his sister Esther, like Mother Grace. She debated whether to bring a rosary, but decided against it. Harry, being of a nebulous religion, wouldn’t understand the significance of prayer beads, might think them peculiar. What if he was some kind of Protestant?
She was walking down the length of the platform, being careful not to trip over her skirt, when she spotted Harry standing under the massive clock. When he saw her, he took off his hat and held it in his hands. She walked up to him, all practical and solemn, allowing herself the smallest of all polite smiles. “Hello, Harry.”
“Hello, Gina. How was your ride in?”
“It was fine. Thank you for asking.”
“You’re welcome.” He was bundled up in a coat, a gray wool scarf and a smart bowler hat. He carried an umbrella like a walking stick.
She tried not to admire his freshly pressed double-breasted long overcoat, tailored, thick, beautifully made and draped. His shoes were black and shined despite the weather. Only his hair was rumpled and slightly too long, and his face looked as if he had not shaved very recently, perhaps late last evening, if then. She tried so hard not to look at him, and at the same time she needed to look at him, to maintain the businesslike aspect of the purpose of her visit.
She didn’t know where to go from there. Were they going to stand and chat in the middle of the station? She hadn’t thought out that part.
“Have you been waiting long?” she asked. “The train was a few minutes late.”
“No, I’m always early. Unfortunately I’ve picked up my father’s worst habits. Are you comfortable? It’s miserable outside.”
So they were going to go somewhere else. She was also dressed in a coat and hat, but drab not elegant like his. “This is my first cold winter. I’m not used to this weather,” she said, suddenly flushed from their scandalous inequality. “It was never like this in Belpasso.”
“No, I don’t imagine it was.”
“Should we . . . go sit somewhere?” she carefully suggested. “Verity and I used to pass a tea house when we walked to Old South, on Valenti Way . . . why are you smiling?” She was trying to be so proper. What now?
“We could go sit in the tea house,” Harry said, “but you and I will be sitting in separate rooms.”
“Oh.” She was morbidly embarrassed.
“In this country men and women don’t sit down together in public places. Do they in Italy?”
“Oh, absolutely, yes, of course,” Gina stammered, trying to fake being progressive. “My mother and father went out to Luigi’s twice a year . . .”
He said nothing. She said nothing. Before he forgot his manners and pointed out the brutal difference between them and a married couple, Gina, her humiliation flush on her face, busied herself with fastidiously buttoning her coat. “We can walk,” Harry said, “if you like. I have an umbrella.”
“No. I mean, yes. It—it will be fine.”
He opened the station doors for her that led onto Causeway.
Outside snow fell from the inky sky. “It’s perfectly wretched,” Harry said, taking her elbow before she tripped. “Get used to this. It’s going to be like this in New England until the thaw.”
Personally she thought the thaw was already happening, since his palm was cupping her elbow. Perhaps if they had been on the South Pole, he would have taken her whole arm.
The sidewalk was treacherous; she soon slipped on the freezing sleet. How in the world were they going to discuss anything when their lives were imperiled?
“Here,” he said. “Please take my arm. It’ll be easier. I’ll never forgive myself if you fall and break something.”
She tried not to catch her breath as she took his arm. He held the open umbrella over their heads. She walked gingerly next to him, holding up her skirt with her right hand and every once in a while slipping in the icy rain so she could tighten her hold on his forearm. It was dark and the streetlights were on, dancing gold in the white flakes.
“Are you cold?”
“No.”
They walked slowly down Causeway in the direction of North End. She pretended she was being careful. Mill Creek was to the left of them, and many bundled-up men sat on milk crates ice fishing. The park around Mill Creek had benches, appealing in the summer perhaps but now covered with slush. She couldn’t believe her blessed good fortune to have these five minutes with him completely alone on a public street. She would have liked to talk about nothing at all, but simply after a silent meandering be escorted back to her platform, assisted onto the train, and then spend the eighty-minute ride reliving their walk in the snow.
“So tell me what this is about.”
Reverie broken. She swallowed. “Harry, if you could hear me out first please, and then let me know what you think. My English can’t sustain your questions.”
“Withstand. Of course. I will say nothing.”
“You know that my brother has dreams of opening his own restaurant.”
“Do I know this?”
“I thought you said you would say nothing.”
“Excuse me.”
“You do know this. We told you and Ben when we had dinner with you our first evening in America.”
“You told us so many things that evening, and such a fine detail must have slipped my mind, especially since your brother was disinclined to speak to us directly.”
“Harry.”
“Excuse me.”
“My brother works two jobs now, at a local tavern at night and in a sawmill during the day. My mother cleans houses and sews.”
“What about you?”
She didn’t want to tell him she had been forced by nuns and meddling mothers to attend school, because she thought that an association with high school would make her more child-like in his eyes. Adults worked. Children went to school. “I’m very busy with St. Vincent’s,” she said, rushing through her reply. “We are saving our money so we can get a mortgage from a bank to open a restaurant.”
Harry cocked his head in approving assent under the umbrella. “But what is it that I can help you with?”
“Ben mentioned that your family is in the property business.”
“My father is a property developer, that is correct. But not me. I’m still at university.”
“Yes, of course.” Children went to school. To kindergarten. Men went to university. “But soon you will be working with your father, yes? This is your last year of studies?”
“Even you ask me this.” Harry took a breath deeper than he meant to. “I don’t know what my plans are yet.”
“Right. But you are going to work with your father?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Gina frowned, keeping a steady eye on the slick pavement. The snow was coming down heavier. She didn’t know what to make of this.
“What can I do for your brother today?” asked Harry.
“Ah. You probably don’t know this, since you don’t have the opportunity to analyze the Lawrence property market, but there are two wonderful places that are available for renovation.”
“Right. I wouldn’t know this. I don’t even analyze the Barrington property market.”
“One place is on Essex Street, in the middle of other restaurants, a wonderful location, very good for business, close to the mills. You remember how busy it was Saturdays?”
“It was quite congested, yes.”
“Exactly. The other is on Broadway across from the train station. That location would do big business for travelers. So I was thinking . . . if we acquire these two places and make them new, because one is now a florist and the other a knitting shop that just closed, but a knitting shop near a train station is not very useful, don’t you agree?”
“Perhaps that explains its difficulties.”
Gina shrugged. “I suppose. But how do you explain the closing of a florist in the middle of a busy shopping street?”
“Too many florists? This one charges too much for flowers? The quality of the flowers is not good?”
“I don’t think that’s it,” Gina said. “I think it is unlucky. But an Italian restaurant that serves inexpensive, wellprepared food . . .”
“Will be more lucky?” finished Harry.
“Yes!”
“Well, what is it you want me to do, Gina?”
“Here it is . . .” She was glad they were walking and she could keep her eyes on the road, not his face. “Harry—if you could somehow help my brother get a loan from a bank to acquire these two places, and then help us by making them into restaurants, the way your father makes those apartments in North End into, you know . . .”
“Apartments?”
“Yes. Just to get my brother started . . .” She didn’t finish.
“You want me to provide the capital?”
Now she looked up at him. “I promise you, we will not let you down. We will be successful and we’ll pay you back, with interest, and you will make money. Also,” she quickly went on before he interrupted her again and she lost the gist of what she needed to lay out before him, “you might be interested in becoming part owner of our establishment? Minority owner, of course. But then our success would become your success, and you would make money from us, which would help your business elsewhere. You told me your father liked to help local business . . .”
“I didn’t say this to you,” Harry said gently.
She felt him looking at her. She studied where she was stepping. “It must have been to Ben.”
“You call Lawrence local business?”
“It is a good business idea. And it would help my brother. Because no bank is going to give him money right now. He hasn’t been in this country long enough. He doesn’t have savings. He asked at First National Bank of Lawrence what it would take to get credit. They gave him a list of things so long, it depressed him for a week. He almost gave up.”
He watched her thoughtfully. She tried not to blush or avert her gaze. “How do you know anything at all about business, Gina?”
“From my father.” She smiled with open pride. “He had a barbershop in a very good part of Belpasso, right where all the bankers went to have their lunch and siesta in the afternoons. He advertised himself to be the quickest barber in town. In and out in under ten minutes or your haircut was free. In no time at all, he had to hire six helpers because he had more business than he could handle. Every day but one he closed by five o’clock so he could go home to his family. He was a good family man, my father.”
“And a good barber,” said Harry.
“Yes.” Gina was happy that Harry remembered. “He became known all over our town and even in nearby Catania as the Barber of Belpasso—all because he took over a newsagent that was one of four in the same area.”
“Your father was wise.” Harry said. “And his daughter’s plan is not bad. I have to think about it. I have no money of my own, so if this is to work, I will have to go and discuss it with my father. And he may be stretched thin in other areas, and may have objections to this I can’t see because he is very good at business, while I’m just good at reading.”
“I understand. Thank you for listening to me.”
They were past Copp’s Hill Burying Ground when Harry gradually stopped walking. “Shall we go back? Any further and we’ll be in the harbor.”
Regretfully she turned back. This time she walked even more slowly. She told him it was because she was tired.
“Should I get us a carriage?”
“No, no.” She sped up just enough so he wouldn’t offer to get them a carriage again.
“I have one question, Gina.”
She waited.
“Your brother Salvo,” Harry asked, “he knows you’re here, of course?”
“Oh, he thinks this is a very good idea.”
“Not what I asked, but all right. I mention this,” Harry went on, “because I’ve met your brother. The most recent time was almost two months ago when Ben and I came to Lawrence to invite you to my house for Thanksgiving. He was too proud to accept our invitation for dinner. I’m just saying that a young man like that seems an unlikely candidate to accept help in procuring a loan.”
“This is business,” said Gina quickly. “The other thing, maybe he thought it wasn’t business.”
“The other thing wasn’t business. It was hospitality. Much easier to accept than money.”
“Not for my brother.”
“Really. Well, he must be quite a special young man.”
“He is.”
The weather had gotten worse, the snow was heavy. Under his umbrella they walked down Causeway. Even the ice fishermen had fled. He tightened his grip on her arm. She didn’t think this was the time to tell him she used to run barefoot up the jagged volcanic rock of Mount Etna. She was not born to fall on a flat paved street. It was constitutionally impossible. Instead she squeezed his arm, without words.
He waited with her until the train came, helped her up to the landing, tipped his hat. “I’ll talk to my father, and I’ll be in touch,” he said, as the train started moving.
Gina’s wish had come true. Having forgotten all the words they had spoken, she had eighty minutes on the trip back to Lawrence to recall nothing but the feel of his wool coat under her ungloved hand as she walked beside him in the falling snow, as if he were a gentleman and she were a lady.
3
The opportunity took months, but finally presented itself. It had been sleeting and in the lumberyards, sleet coupled with dirt made all surfaces hazardous for young women in their oilskin coats and boots. And this young woman was walking too quickly to get out of the weather, and she slipped and fell. Salvo happened to see it from the warehouse, and in an instant he was by her side helping her up. She seemed dazed and slightly embarrassed.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“I’m fine, thank you.” She waited for him to let go of her, which, when he got the message, he did with alacrity.
“You could have really hurt yourself,” Salvo said.
“I’ve fallen off horses,” she said. “This is nothing.” She glanced down at her mud-covered coat and boots and shook her head. “I am quite a mess, however. I will have to go clean myself up. Will you excuse me, please?”
He offered her his arm. “Please, let me help you inside,” he said. His Italian accent sounded so heavy on him all of a sudden, and his third-hand and battered jacket so beggarly when in such proximity to her fine wool threads.
“That won’t be necessary.” She scrutinized him. “What is your name?”
“Salvatore Attaviano,” he said, lifting his hat. “All my friends call me Salvo.” He smiled, showing her the full set of his superb Sicilian teeth.
She didn’t return his smile. “I’m Miss Porter, Mr. Attaviano. My father owns this lumberyard. And I’m fine. But thank you for your quick reflexes.” And without saying another word, Miss Porter walked off, just as quickly and incautiously as before, slipping and nearly falling twice more in the viscous wet mud before she made her way across the yard and inside the managers’ house.
4
Alice and Harry were having their customary Wednesday dinner at Alice’s home in Brookline. Usually her parents surrounded her, but tonight Harry had gotten to Brookline later than usual and Orville and Irma, after sitting with them for a half-hour, retired upstairs. Only Sheffield, the Porter’s butler, and Trieste, Alice’s personal maid, sat in the dining room with them. They were almost alone.
“Why were you so late tonight, dear?” she asked after they had been served their soup and salad simultaneously to speed things up.
“I got caught up in things,” he said. “And have you seen the weather? I saw three fallen horses on the way.”
“I know, it’s ghastly.” She lightly tapped his arm before she took her knife. “I love it when you get caught up in things. It’s one more thing about you, darling, I find completely irresistible.”
“How can I be that lucky?”
“Because you’re adorable,” she said, leaning in slightly and kissing the air above his nose. “That’s why you’re that lucky. Even when you’re unpardonably late.”
“Why is everyone being so accommodating to me recently?” he asked. “You, your parents?”
She smiled. “Perhaps they’re being hopeful?” Before Harry got discomfited, she changed the subject to the first foolish thing that sprung to her lips. “Darling, did you hear about the two men who drowned not far from Barrington? Simply awful, isn’t it? Their poor families. In icy water, too.”
“I think it probably doesn’t matter if the water is freezing or boiling,” Harry said, staring blankly into his roast mustard chicken. “How did it happen?”
“No one knows. They were found in shallow, nearly frozen waters.”
“Even more suspicious then. Sounds like murder.”
“No, no. Nothing as exciting as that.” She sighed. “Didn’t you read the paper?”
“I did. But I don’t read the gossip pages.”
“This wasn’t in the gossip pages.”
“I don’t read the obituaries either.”
Alice suddenly stopped speaking and put down her utensils.
“God—I’m terribly sorry,” she said, placing her hand over Harry’s. “That was so thoughtless of me.”
Harry blinked, once, twice. “Don’t be silly. Tell me about some other horrible thing that’s happened. Though, you know, Esther and I get plenty of that from Elmore.” Harry forced a laugh, squeezing Alice’s fingers. “I think it’s one of the reasons Esther won’t reject him outright. She is titillated by his stories of hideous infections.”
Alice tittered in surprise. “Your sister doesn’t seem to me the kind of woman who would be.”
“Esther is surprising in many ways,” Harry said. “Are you ready for dessert?”
Alice clapped. “Oh yes. I’m so glad you don’t have to rush off. Sheffield said the crème brûlée tonight is heavenly.”
“How appropriate,” said Harry. “Because you’re heavenly.”
They smiled at each other, sipped their wine, nuzzled the air in front of them.
“The weather’s been horrid, hasn’t it?”
“Demonic.”
“I actually fell today. On flat ground.” She shook her head.
“Are you all right?”
“Fine. Nothing injured but my pride. It’s unheard of. Just proves how terrible the weather has been. I love our city,” Alice said, “but I do wish sometimes I lived in a place where it was a wee bit warmer. Don’t you?”
Harry shrugged. “Never really thought about it,” he replied. “Like where? Greece or the South of France?” He paused. “Italy?”
Alice became animated. “I meant more like out west. But you know I’ve always dreamed of traveling to Italy. The whole country sounds so delightful and romantic. And warm.”
“Does it?”
“Harry!” Alice laughed. “Why do you sound so far away, as if you’ve never even heard of Italy?”
He smiled. “Unlike you, I’m so rarely outside, I barely notice the weather. Italy, Boston, all about the same.”
“Do you see what I mean?” She gazed at him affectionately. “Completely irresistible. You don’t go outside because you’re always reading and writing, bent over a desk.”
“I go outside sometimes,” Harry said. “I walk out of my front door and get into a carriage. But it brings me only so close to Gore Hall.”
“Yes, that’s true, you do have to walk a little bit.” She stirred his tea. “I’m surprised you’re in as good a condition as you are, considering how little you move your body.”
He rapped on his temple. “I’m moving in here,” he said. “Never stopping.”
Crème-brûlée was indeed exquisite, the tea from India very aromatic. The after-dinner cognac warmed their throats, made Alice flushed and giggly and Harry less reticent than usual. They sat in the library while Sheffield stoked the fire every five minutes.
Alice was slightly intoxicated and giggling.
“What is he doing?” she whispered theatrically to Harry. “How much attention can a fire need?”
They broke out into a fit of laughter which they tried to suppress.
“We don’t want him to be titillated,” whispered Alice.
“Of course not. Or do we?”
Alice gasped in mock-horror. “Harry, what’s gotten into you, darling?”
“I don’t know,” he muttered, moving closer to her on the couch, nuzzling her cheek. “Perhaps I’m getting tired of waiting.”
Alice embraced him tightly. “Me too, darling,” she whispered. “Me too.”
He pulled away to stare at her. Blushing, Alice shook her head. “Dear heart,” she said, kissing his temple. “Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not the girl who gives away the milk for free.”
Lightly he kissed her. “Of course you’re not, darling. Forgive me for giving you the utterly false impression that I thought you were.”
“You’re always an impeccable gentleman, Harry,” Alice said. “Sometimes I wish you would give me that impression.”
“Now who’s getting amorous?” He pulled himself up off the couch. “It’s a good thing I’m not at the reins,” he said. “Or I’d be in Mill Creek for sure.”
“In where?”
“Oh, this little pond where men ice fish in the winter. Never mind.” He gave her his hand to help her up. “It’s late, Alice dear, and I bid you good night.”
“I’ll see you Sunday,” she said at the open door, wrapping her shawl tighter around herself in the chill wind. “Will you promise me to think about things?”
“That’s all I do,” said Harry, bowing before he put on his hat. “I think about things.”
When, a few days later at lunch, Belinda asked Alice why she so studiously insisted that Harry have dinner every week at her house, like it was church, Alice, batting her eyelashes, replied, “Because everybody knows, silly Belinda, that there is only one place for a gentleman to propose to a lady and that is under her father’s roof.”
“Ah. Of course, you little mannered sneak.” Belinda laughed. “You think eventually he’ll get the hint?”
“I hope so,” said Alice. “And soon. I’m already twentytwo. How many child-bearing years can I possibly have left?”
5
“I don’t think it’s a good investment, son,” Herman said to Harry when they spoke about the restaurants some weeks later. It had taken Harry until February to bring up the matter. He was vaguely intrigued by the idea of investing in a business, separate from his father’s developments, and all other hefty considerations aside—and hefty they were—thought on the surface of it, it was not an unwise plan, nor financially unsound. It chafed him not to be able to make a decision like this on his own; it made him feel small. Here was this immigrant girl coming to see him because he was a building manager, a superintendent of an entire block of houses in a teeming neighborhood. Ben had been feeding her stories about Harry’s ancestors coming down the plank from the Mayflower, fighting for independence, signing the Articles of Confederation, and founding towns, yet here he was, unable to write his own check when he needed to pay for things. It had always been this way. He wanted nothing, but he also wanted for nothing. Whatever small things he desired, he received. He had his personal carriage and plenty of money. College was paid for, all his suits, his every comfort. When he wanted to buy Alice a silk scarf, he asked Louis to go pick one up for him, and that evening the scarf would be bought and wrapped and waiting in his room to give to her. Harry didn’t know what it was like to be without, to go without. Yet suddenly at twenty-two, nearly graduated from Harvard, here he was, interested in investing in a simple business deal, and he had to go to his father, hand outstretched.
But worse, there was his father, shaking his head, saying he didn’t think it was a good investment. It was what nightmares were made of. Finally Harry approaches his father with a small request and has it promptly rejected. Harry waited. It was always better to let Herman have his say. The man was not very good at rebuttal, but very good in firing the first long salvo.
“However, I’m pleased you’re showing an interest in something, Harry,” Herman went on.
“What do you mean, Father? I’m interested in so many things.”
“I mean something real.” He continued before Harry could interrupt. “I know something about Lawrence. It’s not where you want to invest. The town has serious labor problems, and it won’t be long before they’ll be in trouble. You’ve seen what’s been happening in Pennsylvania, in West Virginia. Lawrence is next.”
“You’re worried about the unions?” said Harry. His father was always worried about the unions. “The restaurants will be non-unionized. I’ll make sure of it.”
“It’s not about the restaurants,” Herman said. “It’s about the demography. Lawrence is an immigrant town, and for some reason rife with the kind of influence that absolutely kills business. Apparently Eugene Debs is close to consolidating and forming the American Socialist Party.”
“Who?”
“Oh, Harry. Honestly.”
“Father, they have so many names, the socialists, I can’t keep up.”
“I mentioned him at Thanksgiving. Debs is a critical figure. You might want to keep up with him. Any business you go into, you’ll have to contend with him, and the trouble he’s stirring up.” There was his father, subtly and fraudulently acknowledging that Harry might actually have a choice in the matter of what business to go into! “Just look at Burke, Idaho, or the Lattimer business in Hazleton, or the strikes over silver mining in Leadville, Colorado. What business can survive that kind of climate? Union violence, rioting, shooting, assaults, fires, deliberate arson, bombings and homicides. To get mixed up in it is to throw away good money. We will never see a penny return on it.”
“Father,” said Harry, “everything you say I hear. I’m not disagreeing. Though Pulitzer and Hearst did settle the newsboys’ strike last year and are still in business. But that’s neither here nor there. What is here is this family came from Italy, and they live in Lawrence. They’re not going to relocate to North End, or to Barrington, no matter how much we would like them to. They’re going to try to improve the place they live by opening up two restaurants. That’s admirable. You told me so yourself. You invested with your former partner in Florida . . .”
“Yes,” said Herman blackly. “And we paid dearly for my hubris, for my mistakes.”
Harry frowned. “That’s not what I meant. You had said then, and I remember this, why go all the way south to throw away your hard-earned money, when you can throw it away on your own cobbled streets?”
“I should have listened to myself. And I didn’t say that precisely, but all right.” Herman gazed soberly at his son. “What’s your interest in this family?”
Harry shrugged.
“Suddenly business interests you?”
He shrugged again. “The remaking of something old into something new interests me.”
“This isn’t reading, son. This is hard work. Are you aware that labor struggles in a small city make business property values fall off a cliff?” His father was softening.
“Reading is also hard work, Father. After all, I’m graduating summa cum laude.”
“So I’ve heard. Thanks to your exemplary grades, I get a standing invitation to the Harvard Club every Friday. Is Ben also doing well? I haven’t seen him since Christmas.”
“Me neither. He’s thrown himself into his seminar work. He’s become consumed with this Panama business, his work-study internship, his engineering field work. He is always out. I rarely see him around college anymore. I’ll leave a note at his dorm. Perhaps he can come this Sunday and you can talk some sense into him.”
“I’m still trying to talk some sense into you. But good for him. It’s important for young men to find a passion, something they like to do, and are good at.”
“So you keep telling me, Father.”
Herman blinked from across his massive mahogany desk at his son. “Harry, you can find something you love to do, and you can find something you are good at doing. Rare and blessed is the man who happens to combine both these gifts into one vocation.”
“I don’t know that engineering is Ben’s passion, but we’ll see. He does seem to be quite good at it.”
“Not engineering. Building a civilization as he puts it.”
“Well, all right. I’m also trying to build a civilization. Right here on our own cobbled streets.”
“On Lawrence streets.”
“Twenty miles away.” Harry got up. “Should I talk to Billingsworth about the business loan?”
“Yes.” Herman sighed. “If that’s what you want.”
“I do, Father. And thank you.”
“Is this an emotional decision? For reasons I can’t fathom at the moment?”
“Not at all. It’s a business decision, and a good one. In any case, I’d like to get my nose out of the books and into the real world. You keep telling me it’s time. I prefer not to make a mistake, obviously, but if I do, and you turn out to be right, I’d still like it to be my mistake.”
Herman studied Harry approvingly.
Harry was almost out of his father’s office before he turned around. “Oh, and Father,” he said, “seeing that this is my first effort, I’d like to participate in this quietly at the start, without much ado. I would appreciate it if we can keep this between us, at least for the time being. If the enterprise is a success, then let’s blare it from the rooftops. I’ll be the first to boast. But I would prefer not to be mocked at the dinner table just yet, while I’m getting my feet wet getting the whole thing off the ground, pardon the mixed metaphors.”
“Understood,” said Herman. “And pardoned. Your secret involvement in your family’s multi-generational, traditional, New England building business is safe within these office walls.”
6
When the weather was drier, Miss Porter reappeared in the lumberyard one morning, waiting for a shipment that had been delayed. She seemed irritated, frequently gazing at her gold pocket-watch as she paced up and down the yard. Salvo was walking from panel wood to scrap wood when he passed her. Taking off his cap, he bowed to her slightly and, smiling, said, “Good morning, Miss Porter. How are you today?”
She seemed surprised that he was speaking to her. She turned to him, recognized him, and then glanced away to the gates, through which nothing was arriving. “I’m fine, thank you,” she said. And nothing more.
He bowed to her again. “Have a good day,” he said, walking on.
“I may be wrong, Frederick,” Alice said to her yard manager later that morning. “But I suspect Mr. Attaviano may be a masher.”
“He is a very good worker, Miss Porter,” said Frederick, “a quick learner.”
“I’m glad to have him on board,” said Alice. “But be that as it may, there is something improper about the way he looks at me. Please ask him not to speak to me first.” She looked out the window to see if she could catch a glimpse of him. “He doesn’t understand how things are. Who knows how they do things in his country, so don’t be too harsh with him, but do explain to him firmly that in our country it’s just not done.”
“I will do, Miss Porter,” said Frederick. “But what if I can’t make him understand?”
“Well then, be as harsh as you need to be to make him understand, Frederick.”
“Yes, Miss Porter.”
Alice looked for the impertinent young man the next day in the yard but he had disappeared. A few days later, Frederick informed her that the Italian gentleman had taken great offense at being upbraided. He had denied any wrongdoing, said that rules of etiquette between all people demanded no less and no more than common courtesy, and quit on the spot. “Didn’t even wait for his pay from the week before.”
Flushed, Alice nodded. “So impertinent. He was right to resign, Frederick. It’s a shame you didn’t get to fire him first. I was right in suspecting he was on the make. No decent man would quit a good job just because of pride. That’s cracked.” She shrugged. “Oh, well. Perhaps he can be taught in his next position. I hold out little hope for him and others of his ilk. I try to help them, and look what happens. To even think . . .”