Land of a Thousand Dreams

by BJ Hoff

  It wasn’t going to be that easy….

  Something in the disturbing blue eyes, the hard mouth, the tight set of his jaw served notice that she was up against more than what might have been an understandable antagonism and resentment of her intrusion. She suddenly knew herself to be pitted against an adult intelligence—a formidable intelligence, she suspected—and the highly volatile temperament of a troubled, complex young man.

  Shaken, Sara clenched her hands at her sides, struggling all the while to keep her smile in place. “Tierney, I really want us to be friends. I thought it might help if we could somehow…clear the air between us. Perhaps get to know each other a little better.”

  Every angle of his face was taut, his eyes guarded, openly hostile. He reminded Sara of a drawn bowstring with an arrow ready to fire. “I think I know you well enough,” he said, his voice dripping with scorn.

  Anger flared in Sara. She had all she could do not to rail back at him, to go on the offensive. Instead, she met his contempt with a level look and said evenly, “I know that’s what you think. But, in fact, you don’t know me at all. I’m suggesting that, for your father’s sake, you at least be fair enough to give me a chance.”

  His unpleasant, freezing gaze raked her face. “What do you care,” he said slowly, “whether I know you or not? You’ve got what you set your cap for. I understand the wedding is to be a Christmas event.”

  Sara gave a stiff nod. “Your father told you. Did he explain that it will be just family and friends—a small service at home?”

  His mouth twitched, then cracked to a nasty smile. “At home? That would be the mansion on Fifth Avenue, I expect?”

  Clinging to a remnant of her self-control, Sara said, “In the chapel, yes. You…you will be there, for your father?”

  Something flickered in his eyes, then ebbed. “Not bloody likely,” he said in a low, hard voice.

  “Tierney!” Shocked by the profanity, Sara fought against the hot tears flooding her eyes. That he would dare to wound Michael by deliberately staying away from the wedding was inconceivable!

  “You wouldn’t do that to your father,” she said, blinking furiously to blot the tears before he saw them. “Surely you wouldn’t hurt him that way. Don’t you know how much you mean to him?”

  He glared at her in insolent silence. For a long time they remained that way, as if engaged in a duel of wills. Frozen between indignation and disbelief that he would actually behave in such a crude, hateful manner, Sara felt a wild urge to lash out at him, to loose an entire stream of invective just to see if she could pierce his control.

  Just as quickly, she remembered that she had come to make things better, not worse. “Why…” Her voice faltered, and she hesitated, then went on. “Why, exactly, do you dislike me so much? If you question my feelings toward your father—”

  He laughed, an ugly, harsh sound. “Oh, I don’t question your feelings, Miss Sara,” he shot back in a mocking tone of voice. “Not for a minute.”

  She stiffened. “And what, exactly, is that supposed to mean?”

  He shrugged, a gesture of indifference.

  Sara knew she was rushing headlong into treacherous water, that she was dangerously close to losing what was left of her composure. But something urged her on, forced her to ignore any sense of caution. “You don’t understand why your father wants to marry me—is that it?”

  Tierney shrugged again, a gesture of indifference. When he lifted his eyes to hers, they held a look of such transparent scorn that Sara felt as if he had struck her.

  “No, that’s not it!” he drawled with an ugly sneer. “Only a fool could fail to see why he’s marrying you.”

  His scathing look held a world of innuendo. Rage warred with despair in Sara. For a moment she thought she would strangle on the torrent of fury and pain washing over her. “How dare you!” she burst out, her voice trembling as violently as the rest of her body. “How dare you insult your father in such a way! You know he would never play false with a woman, not for all the money in the world!”

  Sara stepped closer to the bed, her pain and anger out of control. “You know the kind of man your father is! How can you possibly lie there and pretend you don’t?”

  He reared toward her, his mouth open to counter her blast of anger. Sara flinched, but refused to back down. The blood roared in her ears, her voice shook, but she went on. “I came here because I’d hoped to convince you that I can make your father happy. I thought if we could talk, alone, you might see that you have no reason at all to resent me.”

  Resolved not to flinch under the look of pure enmity he now fastened on her, Sara strained to keep her voice from breaking. “The truth is,” she choked out, “you don’t care at all about your father’s happiness. If you did, you wouldn’t be lying here, the victim of your own foolhardiness. You wouldn’t have gone to work for a criminal like Patrick Walsh in the first place, and this never would have happened to you! You’re altogether too selfish to concern yourself with your father’s happiness, or anyone else’s, for that matter! You don’t care about anything or anybody except yourself, and—”

  A light rap on the door brought Sara’s tirade to a halt. She whirled around, momentarily at a loss at the unexpected interruption.

  The door opened, and a tall, slender man in an elegantly tailored suit stepped into the room. Sara knew immediately who he was: Patrick Walsh. She was struck by an unsettling sense of cold as he entered. Nothing in his appearance—the immaculate grooming, the impeccable attire, the veneer of good looks—gave the slightest hint that he was anything but the well-to-do, successful businessman he purported to be. Yet for all his outward charm, a faint aura of corruption hovered about him like a vile stench in the air.

  Admittedly, she knew too much about the man, mostly from Michael’s merciless indictments, to be in the least objective about him. Yet she instinctively knew that the uneasiness he touched off in her had little to do with Michael’s accusations. There was something wrong with Patrick Walsh…something missing in him, something vital.

  Unable to help herself, Sara met his eyes. She gave an involuntary shudder at the pale emptiness she encountered.

  Patrick Walsh found himself sharply irritated by the Farmington woman.

  Alice had gone back inside the house, but he still stood on the front porch, watching the hired hack drive away with Sara Farmington. He wasn’t quite certain what it was, exactly, about the woman that grated on him so.

  She was a proud one, that was evident. The look she’d given him upstairs had held a mixture of aversion and censure. Not what he was used to from women. Even the hoity-toity society toads uptown usually found him hard to resist, if he chose to lay on the charm.

  But Sara Farmington had eyed him as if he were a snake. Her haste to leave would have been amusing had her revulsion not been quite so obvious.

  As the hack disappeared down the lane, it occurred to Walsh that what he found more galling than the woman’s arrogance was the fact that she was soon to become the wife of that stiff-necked police captain, Burke. The Farmington fortune would eventually fall into the lap of that crusty, crusading cop.

  Turning to go back inside, he uttered a low grunt of disgust. Obviously, the high and mighty Miss Farmington must be stupid beyond belief.

  But, then, he reminded himself, most women were.

  That night, when Michael showed up at the mansion well past eight, Sara knew he had been to see Tierney. His expression was positively thunderous.

  She went to the door herself, half expecting him. He wedged past her, stopping just inside as she closed the door.

  “I’ve just come from Walsh’s,” he clipped without preamble.

  He made no move to touch her. His face was flushed, more than likely from anger rather than the long walk from the ferry. His hair was dripping wet from the rain, as was his coat. He was, quite obviously, about to explode.

  “Let me take your coat—”

  “Bother the coat!” he burst out, g
laring at her. “I’m far more interested in finding out what you were doing on Staten Island today! Whatever possessed you to do such a daft thing?” The brogue in his speech had thickened noticeably, as was usually the case when he was angry or tired. Sara had learned to trust it as a surprisingly accurate barometer of his moods.

  Forcing down a stab of irritation that he would speak to her so harshly, Sara said, “Michael, you’re quite drenched! Please, give me your coat and we’ll talk.”

  Before he could say another word, she moved to help him shrug out of his coat, draping it over the coat-tree near the door. “There’s a fire in the parlor,” she said. “Let’s go in there.”

  With his mouth set in a grudging line, he followed her. In the parlor, he stood, hands knotted behind his back, looking for all the world like a smoldering pyre about to erupt in flames.

  He started in at once. “I’m waiting, Sara. I’d like to know what you hoped to accomplish. What were you thinking to do such a thing?”

  Still struggling not to lose her own temper, Sara turned to face him. “I was thinking,” she said with carefully controlled calm, “of you. And your son. I had hoped that if Tierney and I could have a chance to talk alone, I might somehow convince him to let go of his resentment toward me. That’s why I went, Michael; and quite frankly, I don’t think it’s cause for you to bully me.”

  His jaw tightened still more. “I’m not bullying you! And for your information, the only thing you accomplished was to make Tierney more spiteful than ever!”

  “I scarcely think that’s possible,” Sara said sharply. “Nor do I think you have the right to scold me as if I were a child.”

  “I am simply trying to figure why you didn’t at least tell me you planned to go.”

  “Because you would have asked me not to go,” Sara said reasonably. “Or, rather, you would have ordered me not to go.”

  She saw his shoulders stiffen.

  “It seemed like a sensible idea,” Sara went on. “Grandy Clare thought it was the thing to do, and—”

  “Grandy Clare?” he bit out. “Your grandmother put you up to it, then?”

  “No, my grandmother did not put me up to it. She simply suggested—”

  “Why does it seem that she’s suggesting quite a number of things for us lately? First, she would have us living with her, and now she’s sending you off to Staten Island to the house of a known crime boss—” He broke off, scowling murderously. “Perhaps your grandmother might try stirring her own broth a bit more instead of ours!”

  “Michael!”

  Another blast of anger flashed from his eyes. “You truly don’t see it, do you, Sara? You don’t have an inkling of the danger you let yourself in for today—going to that viper’s house alone?”

  Sara stood staring at him in hopeless silence. Only now did it begin to dawn on her that he wasn’t angry because she had gone to see Tierney. Rather, he was angry…because she had frightened him.

  She didn’t know whether she should feel pleased that he cared so much, or enraged that he thought her such a fool she couldn’t take care of herself around a disgusting man like Patrick Walsh.

  Once her mind had registered the reason for his anger, she stood searching his relentless features, undecided as to how to respond. “I wasn’t in any real danger, Michael,” she began carefully. “Mrs. Walsh was there—and the servants. What do you think might have happened to me in a house full of people?”

  Something flickered in his eyes, and Sara thought that at last the full heat of his anger was beginning to abate. Speaking more quickly now, she went on. “As for Grandy Clare—when I told you last night about her suggestion that we live with her, you didn’t seem to feel she was interfering. You said it was worth thinking about. I don’t understand why, now—”

  As she watched, his shoulders sagged just a fraction and the fire in his eyes began to go out. “I don’t mean to say she’s interfering,” he said, his voice strained. “But I’ll not pretend I like her prompting you to go off to Walsh’s house.”

  Sara shook her head. “You’re making far too much of this.” Meeting his eyes, Sara asked him directly, “Did I frighten you? Is that it?”

  He unlocked his hands from behind his back, passing one across his chest in a distracted gesture. The look he gave her was still guarded, defensive—but no longer angry. “And why wouldn’t I be frightened for you? You know well enough what Walsh is. I’ve spared few details in telling you about the man. If you felt you had to go, I should have gone with you!”

  She groped for patience. “If you had gone with me, it would have defeated my reason for going. I told you, I wanted to talk with Tierney alone.”

  “Yes…well, I can’t very well look after you if I don’t know what you’re about half the time. It seems to me you might have told me what you intended.”

  And therein, Sara realized, lay at least a part of the problem. She had ventured out of the range of his protection without letting him know what she intended—and without asking him his opinion.

  Or his permission?

  The hateful thought was quickly gone, but left Sara troubled. She was being unfair, of course. Michael’s overdeveloped sense of responsibility, his desire to protect her, was unquestionably motivated by love. Yet she could not quite shake off the disquieting image of a grim-faced Michael attempting to confine her—and everyone else he cared for—inside a clinging net woven from his love. A net that would give them protection but precious little freedom.

  Trembling, she lifted her hand in a tenuous appeal, then let it fall when he remained motionless. “Will you listen to yourself?” she said, her voice thick with emotion. “Michael, for goodness’ sake, I’m not a child! I don’t need you to—to ‘look after me’! I’m quite capable of taking care of myself. I’ve been managing for several years now.”

  He stood staring at her in silence for a long time. Finally, he sighed, saying, “Aye, you have. But you can’t expect me to love you as I do, Sara, and not want to protect you.”

  “Michael, please understand something about my feelings,” Sara said, choosing her words with great care. “Of course, I’d be hurt if you weren’t concerned for my safety. But I have no intention of becoming your…your ward, once we’re married. I want you to be my husband—not my guardian.”

  A deep flush spread over his face, and for a moment Sara thought he was going to explode in a temper. But he merely swallowed, then drew in a long, ragged breath. “It’s just that I know the kind of evil Walsh and his kind are capable of. It’s been hard enough as it is, having Tierney under his roof—in his bed.” He paused and raked a hand down the side of his face. “When I learned you’d been there, alone—” Again he flushed and scowled. “The swine had the nerve to compliment me on my ‘taste in women.’”

  He looked so distraught that Sara could no longer keep her distance. “Oh, Michael, I am sorry!” she cried, closing the space between them and putting an uncertain hand to his arm. “Perhaps I should have told you I was going.”

  He glanced at her hand. “I won’t deny that I wish you had.”

  Moving still closer to him, Sara said softly, “But you would have asked me not to go. You know you would have.”

  He searched her eyes, then after a moment gave a nod. “Aye,” he said somewhat grudgingly, covering her hand with his own. “That’s the truth.” He sighed deeply. “Sara, please—let’s not argue. The thing is done. I’m sorry for storming in here as I did, sorry if I hurt your feelings. I wouldn’t want to hurt you, asthore. Not ever.”

  He pulled her against his chest and held her, saying nothing for a long time. Gently, then, he tipped her face to his. “I can be a great fool at times, Sara a gra. But I do love you. Never forget that I do love you.”

  Then he kissed her, and, at least for the moment, Sara forgot the unsettling image of being caught in a net, a net made of Michael’s love.

  15

  Finbar

  So in peace our tasks we ply,

  P
angur Ban, my cat, and I;

  In our arts we find our bliss,

  I have mine and he has his.

  ANONYMOUS (EIGHTH OR EARLY NINTH CENTURY)

  Now that the weather had turned colder, the new choral group had been granted permission to use one of the two rented mission rooms above the tavern for their weekly rehearsals.

  Today, Evan Whittaker climbed the steps to the rehearsal room with unusual reluctance. Ordinarily, he would be eager to get started. The boys in the group were showing an increasing enthusiasm for the music and a growing unity of spirit—at least, most of the time. If he did say so himself, they were beginning to sound quite good.

  Today, however, in spite of the hours of preparation he had put into the new music for rehearsal, he found himself too distracted to be genuinely enthusiastic. He could think of nothing but Nora as his mind searched for something—something special—that might serve to lift her spirits, to perk her up a bit, as Mr. Farmington would say.

  It had been days since he’d seen a smile on her face—a real smile, that is, not the faint, uncertain curving of her lips she routinely managed just to reassure him. Evan knew that despite her efforts to be cheerful, the longing for a baby had never quite left her. Each day when he returned home from the shipyards, Nora was waiting in a fresh dress, her hair neatly done up and fragrant, the small, sad smile bravely in place. Later in the evening, if she happened to glance up from her sewing to see him studying her with concern, she would immediately urge the smile back into place.

  Giving a deep sigh, he now entered the mission room. The boys were already seated, waiting for him, and at last his heart lifted a little. He stood at the front of the room, scanning the group for a moment. They actually appeared eager to begin.

  There were at least fifteen boys in attendance, a mix of Irish and black youths. Today he noted two new faces among the regulars, one white and one black. Here, at least, the ongoing enmity between the races seemed to take a backseat to the combined efforts of the group.