Children of Liberty Page 17

  “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 twenty-two. 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 a
s 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 …”

  Chapter Eleven

  THE QUARRY

  1

  Dear Gina,

  I’d like to come to Lawrence to speak to you and your brother further about your business proposal. I would also like to bring my loan officer, the aptly named Mr. Billingsworth, to see the properties in question and give us a full appraisal before we proceed.

  When would be a good time to meet with the two of you?

  Yours sincerely,

  Harry Barrington

  IT was the most frightening letter Gina had ever read. What had she done?

  She had expected it would take several more meetings with Harry, perhaps with a stroll on the Common when it got warm, a promenade and an ice cream down by the Charles River to discuss the matter much more fully before it got half this far.

  Harry was clearly a man of action; how terrifying. Maybe this was how things happened in the real world, not the world of dream-like make-believe that Gina inhabited. She hadn’t told Salvo—she hadn’t even thought of telling him. That her brother might, just might, have to get involved in her harebrained plan had not entered her head prior to receiving Harry’s latest letter. The reason there was never even the beginning of a thought about Salvo was because Salvo lived to put paid to her girlish cotton-candy reveries, and it was no fun dreaming about Harry with Salvo’s harsh disapproving face ruining the lemony delights for her. She didn’t know what to do or how to answer the letter. So Gina did the only thing she could think to do.

  Sleeplessly, anxiously, she ignored it.

  Dear Gina,

  I haven’t heard from you and I have to assume that my earlier missive got lost in the post. I am writing again to let you know I am interested in your business proposal and would like to arrange a time to meet with you and your brother, along with my business manager, to go over the fine print details and to see the properties. Please let me know by return post when would be a convenient time to do that. Work on my final dissertation at Harvard begins shortly, and very soon I won’t be able to take the time away from my studies.

  Yours truly,

  Harry Barrington

  Now Gina knew all she had to do was wait. Just a little longer, and Harry would be too busy to help her, and then she could come to Boston and they could talk again about it. After another two weeks passed tensely and it was almost March, Gina finally wrote back.

  Dear Harry,

  I’m sorry to have been out of touch for a few weeks, my mother had caught a cold, and my brother lost his day job and came down with bronchitis. They’re both better now, and so I have a few minutes to reply. I know you said you would be busy with your dissertation. Perhaps after your studies are completed, successfully I am certain, you can let me know when would be a convenient time for you to come to Lawrence. My brother, having been out of work mainly because of his illness, is now working two jobs again, and I don’t know if he’ll be able to join us for our next meeting. But I’ll make sure he will join us for the subsequent one.

  Sincerely,

  Gina

  Dear Gina,

  I have a few weeks before my senior thesis. How does next Friday at 5 o’clock sound to meet with you and Salvo? Please let me know by return post.

  Yours truly,

  Harry

  2

  Salvo reacted like any proud Italian man might react if his baby sister had arranged a loan for him from someone he wished harm to. “Tu sei un pazzo! You have lost your feeble mind,” he said after five minutes of gesticulating wildly and swearing in Italian. “I will never accept. Mai! I would rather beg on the streets for money than accept a loan from him. I would rather wash clothes, sit behind a loom. I would rather throw myself into the erupting Etna. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Salvo, hear me out.”

  “I’ve heard everything I need to and want to. The answer is never.”

  “Salvo …”

  “Mai!”

  “Will you …”

  “Never!”

  “We are not the Hatfields and the McCoys, Salvo,” Harry told Salvo the following Friday evening, sitting across from him at his table i
n Lawrence. “This is a business deal. I’m just helping you get money from the bank. It’s a two-part loan. One, we will instruct the bank to provide the cash to buy the businesses. And then you will need capital to renovate them. That part we are lending you. But we’re charging you interest, and we expect you to pay every month. So you will have your regular mortgage, and also this construction loan. Both will be entirely your responsibility. Billingsworth is going to arrange everything. After the restaurants open, Salvo, you’ll be responsible for the day-to-day operations, for hiring, firing, for running the business. Are you up to it?”

  “Assolutamente.”

  “I will help you with the contractors who will do the construction work on the two properties. The building crew we use is very good. Billingsworth likes the location of the restaurants. He thinks you picked well. And the work shouldn’t take too long. We plan to open by the beginning of summer. After that, you’re on your own—though if you need help, of course we’ll be here. You’ll need a bookkeeper. Unless you think your aunt or your mother can do it?”

  Harry sat back and waited. Billingsworth didn’t speak. Gina didn’t speak. Salvo didn’t speak at first. Then all he said was, “Who in the name of the Mother of God are the Hatfields and McCoys?”

  They continued talking, with the help of olive oil, salt, bread and red wine. This was new to Harry, Gina could see, and with enjoyment watched him dip a tiny piece of bread into the olive oil, sprinkle a few beads of salt on it, and gingerly put it into his mouth. Billingsworth refused to partake entirely, surveying the Attavianos and even Harry with considerable distaste.

  Harry took another piece, this one bigger, put a little more salt on it. Mimoo had just baked the bread that morning, because she knew guests were coming, and the bread, her specialty, was crusty and warm. Gina could see the transformation on Harry’s face, as he ate the bread and drank the wine. It was good. He liked it. “You will need a bookkeeper,” he repeated.

  “My mother can do it,” said Salvo. “I want my family to work with me. This is a family business.”