Shadows of the White City Page 3

  “Welcome back.” Tessa hooked a lock of brown-black hair behind her ear. She bore a strong resemblance to her older brothers, Lorenzo and Louis, whom Sylvie had known for more than twenty years. “You didn’t miss much, other than a few sales of the World’s Fair guidebooks.”

  Sylvie was afraid of that, but not surprised. “All right. Thank you.”

  “One lady came who didn’t buy anything,” Tessa added, “but she asked for you. A Polish lady, maybe in her late forties, beautiful and charming. Jozefa Zakowski? Zapinski, maybe . . .”

  “Zielinksi?” Sylvie guessed.

  “That’s it! Chatty lady, asked several questions. She was disappointed not to meet you both.”

  Rose looked at Sylvie. “You know her?”

  “We’ve corresponded.” As a member of the Chicago Women’s Club, Sylvie had served on a committee that recruited several international guests to the Fair. “She’s an actress from partitioned Poland and is forward-thinking about women’s issues. I invited her to come lecture at the Woman’s Building, and she expressed an interest in touring the rest of Chicago, as well. She was particularly interested in Hull House when I told her about it.”

  Most people were interested in Hull House if they had any concern for the plight of the urban poor, which happened to be mostly immigrants. Founded by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr just four years ago, the settlement house on Halsted Street was a beacon of hope and education in a rough section of town. Sylvie had volunteered with their Reading Club almost since Hull House opened.

  “Since Miss Zielinksi is an actress, do you suppose she might visit during the Hull House Players’ practice?” Rose asked.

  “I’ve already invited her,” Sylvie said. “I forgot she was arriving in town this week. She’s scheduled to speak on Tuesday, and I’m to be her personal tour guide. I’ll see her then, if not before.” She smiled at Rose, gratified that she seemed to approve.

  “Did you have fun with your cousin today?” Tessa asked Rose, one inky eyebrow arching.

  “I had a grand time with Hazel and her friends, yes.” Rose removed the pin holding her straw hat in place and set it on the counter. “But she isn’t really my cousin, you know.”

  Sylvie bit her tongue before she could disagree aloud.

  Tessa checked the clock and filled in her time card. “She might as well be, though, right?”

  Rose shrugged. “It isn’t the same. It’s not like you and your family.”

  “My family has more cousins than we can fit in one house.” Tessa laughed. “Don’t forget, I moved out as soon as I could. I love them, and I don’t mind helping them when I can. But I have a new family, of sorts, with the Jane Club.”

  “That’s right,” Sylvie couldn’t resist remarking. “Some families we’re born into, and some are of our own choosing. Just like I chose you, Rose. We chose each other, didn’t we? Isn’t that a bond at least as strong as blood?”

  Rose gave Sylvie a warm smile. “Yes, Mimi. I love you, too.” She kissed her on the cheek.

  Mimi. The endearment never failed to reassure Sylvie. It was the name Rose had decided to call her when she was a child and Sylvie became her legal guardian. Sylvie would have preferred to hear Mama or Mother instead, but those names had been locked away for Rose when her biological mother, Magdalena, had died on the ship that carried them to America. Sylvie understood.

  Still chatting about the Jane Club, Rose and Tessa took the armchairs flanking the fireplace near the back of the store, Tiny Tim curled on Rose’s lap.

  Sylvie loved this bookshop. After the hubbub and flurry of the Fair, she relished the quiet of this book-filled oasis that smelled of pages and the pastries the Hoffmans sold at her counter. Karl and Anna were now seventy and sixty-seven years old, and had given up their bakery and become her fourth-floor tenants a few years ago. Before that, they’d been her neighbors for as long as she could remember, and they had become dear friends. Now they baked for the bookshop and for themselves.

  Sylvie had arranged a few bistro tables and chairs in the back of the store, where customers could enjoy their pastries and begin reading their new books right away. Before her father had died, the space had been his book-repair workshop. But since she’d never learned the skill of binding books, she’d transformed the area into something new.

  She was good at that—at adjusting and renewing. All of Chicago was. It had grown to one million souls, and that wasn’t counting all the visitors in town for the Fair.

  Taking off her hat, Sylvie moved to the front window, the view from which was dominated by the eleven-story courthouse across the street. The columned and porticoed granite building, together with city hall, took up the entire block bordered by Randolph, LaSalle, North Clark, and Washington Streets.

  Nothing on the display table needed straightening. Copies of Rand, McNally & Co.’s Handy Guide to Chicago and the World’s Columbian Exposition were expertly arranged, along with a fanned-out stack of Chicago by Day and Night: The Pleasure Seeker’s Guide to the Paris of America. A model of Mr. Ferris’s wheel, one of the most recognizable landmarks of the Fair, towered over the books, its cars holding pocket-sized maps and The Time-Saver guidebook.

  A smile lifted the corner of her mouth. She was proud of her city. Just twenty-two years ago, the Great Fire had devastated the business district and rendered one-third of its population homeless, including Sylvie’s family. But Chicago had rebuilt itself in record time and was now hosting the world.

  Sylvie had reconstructed herself, too, after that harrowing chapter in her life.

  “Mimi, listen to this!” Rose called.

  Gladly, Sylvie joined the young women, seating herself in a bistro chair, her dark skirt blotting out the cream tiles that distinguished this area from the rest of the bookshop. “Yes?”

  “This Jane Club sounds amazing. You already know all about it, I suppose?”

  Sylvie did, in fact, know quite a bit about the Jane Club, but Rose looked ready to burst. “Tell me.”

  “It’s named for Jane Addams, of course,” Rose began. “I’m sure you knew that. And it’s a group of single women working in Chicago who share apartments. They cook for each other, share the housework, all of that.”

  “I told you,” Tessa said. “It’s like a family. Not that we always get along, but we’re there for each other. If one of us loses a job suddenly, she doesn’t also lose her room and board. The others can cover it until she finds a new situation. That’s the idea, anyway. We’re no longer dependent on our fathers, but we’re not ‘girls adrift’ either. Independent, making our own way, but not alone. You see?”

  “It truly is a lovely arrangement,” Sylvie agreed.

  “And Tessa’s roommate is cooking tonight. She’s Polish, Mimi, and she’s going to make pierogis. I’d like to join them. Tessa invited me.” Rose clasped Sylvie’s hand. “Please. I want to learn how to make them, and you know I won’t learn it from you.”

  The Jane Club was wonderful, but it was an apartment building in a seedy section of town. And there were so many strangers in Chicago to visit the Fair—or to prey upon those who did. “Who would bring you back home when you’re done?”

  “I’m sure I could find someone.”

  But it didn’t feel right, especially after Rose had shown up to her violin lesson with bruises and smelling of cologne.

  “Another time,” Sylvie said gently. “We’ll make arrangements to be sure you have a proper escort home afterwards, all right?” She could go with Rose herself this evening, if only to see her safely home afterward. She could stay at the coffeehouse around the corner from the Jane Club until it was time to pick Rose up and head home. But she was spent. All she wanted was a quiet evening.

  To Tessa, Sylvie said, “Thank you so much for the offer. Rain check?”

  “Of course, Miss Townsend. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I ought to be going.”

  Sylvie bade her good-bye and waited for the door to close behind her.

  “I’m sorry
you’re disappointed,” she told Rose. She glanced at the bruise again, and Rose hid it behind her back. “I saw that.” The words slipped out before she could think to frame them better.

  “Saw what?”

  “The bruise. How did you come by it?”

  “It’s nothing.” Rose looked at it. “I didn’t even notice it before now.”

  “It looks like someone held you too firmly. What happened, dear?”

  Rose shrugged. “I rode the Ice Railway this afternoon.”

  “You what?” Sylvie had expressly forbidden her to board that rickety contraption.

  “Hazel and her friends were all doing it. Walter was there, too. He said he’d ride with me to keep me safe and assured me you wouldn’t mind if you knew that.”

  Sylvie had a soft spot for Meg’s oldest child, but she did mind being dismissed.

  “We picked up a lot of speed, and on a curve I started to—well, I leaned out of the car unintentionally. Walter grabbed my wrist and yanked me back in. See? Nothing to worry about.”

  Sylvie didn’t understand why the Ice Railway was still in operation after the accident two months ago that had killed a man and injured five others. But at least it explained the marks and why Rose had carried a hint of Walter’s cologne. Still, Sylvie couldn’t resist pointing out that this was exactly why she’d told Rose not to ride it in the first place.

  Rose stood, fire sparking behind her eyes. “You have so many rules for me, Mimi.”

  “Because I love you.”

  “No, because you don’t trust me to make any decisions on my own, even though I finished school. My best friend got married this summer, my other friend left for Cornell University, and you’re still telling me what not to do. That doesn’t feel like love to me, it feels like a cage. But, in the words of Jane Eyre, ‘I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will . . .’”

  Sylvie finished the quote in her mind: which I now exert to leave you.

  “You misunderstand. There’s no need for—” She stopped herself before she would make things worse, pushing Rose away even further. She needed time to think things through. It was true that Rose had completed her schooling this past spring, but she was the youngest in her class. Too young to know yet what she wanted for her future.

  Sylvie fiddled with the buttons on her cuffs. “I’d like to check the ledger before closing up here. Then I’ll come up and start working on dinner. We’ll talk more then.”

  “Don’t bother.” Rose scooped up Tiny Tim and held him to her chest. “Suddenly I’m not hungry.”

  Whatever fear Kristof had glimpsed in Gregor in Music Hall seemed to vanish once they began walking through the Midway Plaisance. Gregor had always been easily distracted, and nowhere on earth was there more to catch the eye than right here.

  Violin cases in hand, they walked west, putting behind them the Fair’s manicured lawns, sculptured fountains, and neoclassical buildings of monumental scale. The World’s Columbian Exposition was a stately affair designed to awe, educate, and inspire. The Midway, a mile-long strip of park stretching inland from one of the Fair’s west entrances, was a rambunctious assault on the senses. By the looks of the crowd, they didn’t mind.

  “We could catch the Houdini brothers if we hurry,” Gregor said. “Did you know they were born in Budapest?”

  “Who?”

  “They do this trick called Metamorphosis where Harry gets trussed up, tied in a sack, and locked in a trunk. A curtain is drawn and pulled back again, and quick as a wink, Harry is free and it’s his brother in the trunk!”

  Mildly intrigued, Kristof mused that he would have given anything to trade places with his brother while they were growing up. “We’re not here for a magic show,” he said instead. They’d agreed to find dinner among the many options on the Midway on the condition that Gregor would tell him the truth behind his reaction to Maestro’s announcement. “German Village?” he suggested. A forest of half-timbered buildings reminiscent of Bavaria rose up on their right behind a gate.

  Gregor waved a hand in dismissal. “How about something a little more exotic?” He pushed ahead in the crowd until smells of sauerkraut and beer gave way to pungent aromas of cooking meats, unusual spices—and camel and donkey dung. Cairo Street was up ahead, a towering minaret spiking the cloudless sky.

  A line of people waited for a uniformed young man to shred their tickets in the turnstile and allow them past the eight-foot-high wall encasing the village of imported Egyptians. Fortune-telling, dancing, and donkey and camel rides were only a few of the attractions available. If they went inside, Kristof wouldn’t stand a chance of commanding Gregor’s attention.

  “Not today.” Kristof steered Gregor around a hawker standing on two chairs outside the Persian concession, past the Eiffel Tower model, and into the shadow of Mr. Ferris’s wheel, the spectacular engineering feat that dwarfed the pride of Paris. Screams crescendoed and decrescendoed from thrill seekers riding the Ice Railway on the left. “We need somewhere we can talk.”

  “We’re talking now.”

  “Not nearly enough.”

  Within three more blocks, they had passed the East India Bazaar, Austrian Village, Chinese Village and Theater, Dahomey Village, and more. “Here we are.”

  Gregor squinted at the unassuming building at the end of the Midway, just beyond the Lapland Village. “Of all places. You can’t be serious, Kristof.”

  “Aren’t I always?”

  “Quite. Serious enough for the both of us.”

  “One of us ought to be.” Kristof chuckled. “After you. No place like home, eh?”

  He extended his hand for Gregor to enter the Hungarian Orpheum and Café. In truth, though they’d been born and raised in Budapest, it had been more than twenty years since he had called Hungary home. After studying music in Vienna and then in Naples, Italy, they’d played with symphonies across Europe before moving to New York and then to Chicago.

  Inside the Orpheum, a large café was arranged in front of a concert stage. A young lady in a bright national folk costume approached them. A scarlet vest trimmed with gold braid covered her white shirtwaist. She spread her embroidered, ruffled apron in a curtsy and flashed a dimpled grin. Gregor charmed her with small talk in Hungarian as she seated them at a table near an open window.

  “Suddenly you don’t seem to mind the venue,” Kristof pointed out as soon as she’d poured their water and left them to their menus. He stowed his violin case beneath his chair while Gregor did the same.

  Gregor’s gaze roved over the dozens of girls serving tables, all of whom seemed to be formed from a similar mold: young, blond, and curvy. “The ambience is more inviting than I expected.”

  “The ambience?” Kristof raised an eyebrow. A breeze fluttered the window’s red-and-white-checked curtain and ruffled his hair. “Keep in mind that these young ladies are other men’s daughters, and they ought to be treated as such. With respect.”

  “Other men’s daughters, eh?” Gregor laughed. “I’d expect such a comment from someone old enough to be their father.”

  Unfazed, Kristof smiled. “You’re right behind me, brother.”

  A waitress arrived at their table, this one wearing an emerald-green vest and an apron embroidered with blue flowers. After introducing herself as Margit, she took their order and whisked away. A Gypsy band from Budapest struck up their next piece from the stage, stomping their tall black boots to the music.

  Kristof took a drink, then focused on Gregor. “No more stalling,” he said. “What’s going on with you? Don’t tell me you’ve already spent your earnings.”

  A muscle twitched next to Gregor’s eye. He plucked a petunia from the window’s flower box and rolled it between his fingers. “Fine. Then I won’t tell you.” He tossed the crushed petals out the window.

  Kristof bit down on his frustration. “Then I’ll assume that since you’ve brought nothing new into our apartment this summer, you haven’t spent the money so much as l
ost it. Gambling.”

  The water glasses on the table began sweating. Gregor shifted to watch the musicians play. He clapped his hands to the beat, effectively shutting off the conversation. But the façade of mirth was pastry thin, and he turned back to Kristof when the song concluded. “All right. I did lose it. I lost pretty big, as it happens. I lost more than I had at the time. I owe a guy.”

  Applause filled the café as the band members took a bow. Neither Bartok brother joined in.

  Gregor wiped the condensation from his glass. “If I don’t get the money to pay him off in the next ten days, I don’t know what will happen to me.” When he looked up, his eyes were slick pools of blue. “How was I to know Thomas would break our contract? How could I have predicted the loss of work?”

  Margit returned, setting before Gregor a plate of lángos, deep-fried bread topped with sour cream and cheese. In front of Kristof, she placed a bowl of meggyleves, a sour cherry soup served cold, perfect for an August day. With a final flourish, she served an order of hortobágyi palacsinta, which they would share. Savory aromas rose from the crepes filled with meat, onions, and spices, served with a paprika sour cream sauce.

  “Anything else I can get you?” Margit asked, her cheeks flushed from the heat.

  “No.” Kristof didn’t mean to sound short with her, but his curt tone sent her quickly away. In a manner just as businesslike, he said a brief prayer to bless the food before addressing his brother. “Gregor, you know my views on gambling. Are you able to stop, or is this a sickness, an addiction as strong as liquor?”

  “If it is, this experience has cured me of it. I swear.” Gregor tore off a piece of the fried bread, folded it in half, and stuffed it in his mouth. After wiping a red linen napkin over his lips, he said, “I just need a little help to pay off my debt, and then that’s it. It’s over.”

  A sigh swelled in Kristof’s chest. He had heard such a speech before. “How do I know you’re serious this time?” With the side of his fork, he cut off a piece of the palacsinta and swirled it in the cream sauce before eating it.