by Bess McBride
“Yes, she is,” Rory murmured. “They both are, but that should not be your concern, Eddie. You are too young for both of them. And at any rate, as they said, they are only visiting. It would not do to give your heart to someone who cannot stay.” Rory realized as soon as he spoke that the words applied to him as well. Regardless of where they came from, the Misses St. John had no intention of staying.
“But they are so delightfully unusual. Not at all like the other girls I know,” Eddie said. “Perhaps we could convince them to extend their visit indefinitely.” Rory understood his wistful note.
“They are unusual,” Rory agreed, “almost as if they come from another time.” Rory stiffened. Had he actually said it?
“Yes, that’s it!” Eddie exclaimed. “I couldn’t put my finger on it, but that is exactly it! It’s as if they are from a less formal world than the one we live in. Is Chicago so very different from Seattle?”
“No, no, it is not,” Rory said. He stared at Annie, who now bent over in the most unladylike fashion to lace one of her boots. “Come, I must help Miss St. John with her footwear.”
Rory strode back to the picnic area just in time to seize Annie under her arm as she threatened to topple over in her quest to don her shoes.
“Allow me, Miss St. John,” he said with a small grin.
She looked up at him with a reddened face from her exertions. “Oh, thanks. I guess I could have leaned on that tree over there.” She stuck her feet into her other boot, and Rory bent on one knee.
“Let me tie them lest you fall over in an ignominious heap.” He smiled broadly. “Place your hand upon my shoulder for balance.” He pushed the edge of her skirt aside to lace up the small boots.
“There’s that smile again, Rory. Now I know where you get it. Your brother has it, and your father has it, too.”
Rory looked up at her with a suddenly sober face. “I do not mean to misuse it, Annie, not as my father does. Until today, I did not realize I shared that trait with him. I would change the nature of my smile if I could to present a more sincere expression.”
“Don’t change anything,” Annie said. “Not a single thing,” she said in a low voice. She cleared her throat. “So, did you tell Eddie everything?”
Rory, touched by her words, redirected his attention to the task at hand.
“No, certainly not. I love my brother, but he is a bit of a talker. I am not sure I could trust him to be discreet. I had forgotten though that I am meant to speak to him about our father. I may as well tell you that my mother announced yesterday morning that she has asked our father for a divorce. That is why you find him at the hotel. Mother wanted me to break the news to Eddie. Not expecting to see him at the park today, I forgot to speak to him. However, this does not seem the appropriate venue for such a discussion.”
“Oh, gosh, I’m sorry, Rory.” Rory felt the soft touch of Annie’s fingers along his cheek. He turned his face into the palm of her hand and kissed it before jumping up.
Annie’s cheeks flamed, and she looked away toward the carriage. He noted she rubbed her hands together.
“I should apologize but find I cannot,” Rory said. He cleared his throat. “Come, let us return you to the hotel so that you may rest before dinner tonight.”
“You don’t have to keep babysitting us, Rory,” Annie said in a husky voice. “Marie and I can fend for ourselves. Really.”
“I do not ‘babysit,’ Miss St. John. It is my privilege to escort you to dinner. However, if you feel you wish to dispense with my company, I can oblige you. It is not my intention to force myself upon you and your sister.”
“Oh, no! That’s not it at all,” Annie said. “I just think you must have some kind of life you might want to get back to. Eddie mentioned friends.” She said no more.
“I am fortunate in that I do have friends here in Seattle, given that I travel so much, but I do not need to see them every time I am in town. My mother, however, is another story. She does insist on seeing me, and as soon as Eddie mentions you and Miss Marie, I am sure she will want to meet you. I apologize if I seemed reluctant for you to meet my mother. That was not my intention. I sought only to prevent further unanswerable questions. I will speak with her this afternoon but feel certain she would echo Eddie’s invitation to dinner tomorrow night. Would that be agreeable to you? Should we ask Miss Marie?”
He looked toward Marie, still conversing with Joseph and Eddie. The younger Miss St. John appeared to have an ease with men, no doubt due to her athletic enterprises. Annie, on the other hand, though more reserved with men, seemed to elicit adoration. At least, she had drawn his.
Rory dropped the sisters off at their hotel and made his way home to wash before hurrying over to his mother’s house. He did not care to have her stew about the strange new women in her son’s life for overly long. Rory had no doubt his brother had already told his mother about the Misses St. John, and he was anxious to attempt some sort of explanation.
He hopped into his automobile and headed for his mother’s house, arriving just as Eddie could be heard regaling his mother with news of Rory’s “new friends.”
“One is very tall, statuesque like a Grecian goddess,” his brother waxed unexpectedly eloquent. “The other sister, Miss Annie St. John, is petite with chestnut hair and eyes of chocolate.”
His mother, seated on a sofa in the parlor while Eddie paced in front of her, saw Rory enter and rose to kiss him on the cheek.
“Rory! I have just been hearing of your new friends from your brother, who appears to have become besotted with one of them. How did you meet these young women and where did they come from? Are they from a local family?”
Rory shot his brother a dark look and settled his mother back onto the sofa before taking a seat himself. She poured him a cup of tea.
“Do sit down, Eddie,” Rory said. He accepted the tea from his mother. “You speak of the Misses St. John, I believe, Mother. Yes, Eddie is quite taken with them.” He sipped his tea, still unsure what he wanted to tell his family.
“The Misses St. John are visiting from Chicago. That is really all I know. I met them on the train. Since we are here together though, perhaps now would be a good time for us to have that discussion you mentioned.” He quirked an eyebrow in his mother’s direction.
“Oh! Yes, of course, that makes sense,” his mother said with a harried look at Eddie, who had taken a seat on the sofa. “Dear, I wanted to talk to you about your father.”
Eddie turned to her with interest. “So, Father is to be the subject of the appointment Rory had set for me tomorrow. I am all ears.”
“Eddie, Mother finds the subject difficult, and she wanted me to broach the subject first. Since you are neither ignorant nor obtuse, I think it would be best if I were straightforward with you. Mother informed me yesterday that she has asked Father for a divorce.”
Rory’s mother winced at his directness, and she turned an apprehensive look on her younger son.
Eddie nodded. “I suspected as much. I knew when Father moved to the hotel that he would not be able to come back. You have been less angry since he has been gone, Mother.”
Rory smiled at his brother, who had apparently inherited their mother’s compassion.
“Yes, you do appear to be more calm, Mother,” Rory agreed. “Eddie took that quite well, I think, don’t you?”
Mrs. O’Rourke looked from one of her sons to the other in bemusement. “Yes, he did,” she murmured. “I thought you would be terribly upset, Eddie. There will be scandal, of course. People will talk.”
Rory held back the retort, “Not more than they already do.”
“It will blow over in no time at all, Mother. Don’t fret,” Eddie said. “Father will be fine. He always seems to land on his feet.”
“Well, then,” their mother said, looking down with pink cheeks and smoothing her skirt. “As long as my sons do not disapprove of me, I shall be fine.”
“You know you have my blessing, Mother,” Rory murmured.
“And mine,” Eddie echoed. He leaned over to kiss her on the cheek. Mrs. O’Rourke cleared her throat.
“Well, tell us more about these young women then,” she said. “What do you mean ‘they are visiting?’ Are they visiting relatives? Eddie mentioned they wished to procure lodgings in a boarding house? I sense a mystery, Rory.”
Rory sighed.
“I really do not know much more than I have told you, Mother. They appear to be low on funds and do not wish to stay at the hotel for much longer. I do not know whom they came to visit. It is my understanding they do not have family here.”
“Did you offer to assist them, Rory? You were never mean with money. I understand that they are strangers, but they are young ladies. I would think you would have helped them.”
Rory’s jaw tightened. “Of course I offered assistance, Mother, but they have declined any offer of financial help.” Rory was not about to tell his mother of their apparent destitution. To do so would only raise further questions.
“But you will invite them to dinner tomorrow night, won’t you, Mother?” Eddie said. He turned to Rory. “I already asked Mother to have them over.”
“I do not see how I could not,” she said with an affectionate smile at her youngest son. “I am more curious now than ever to meet them. Rory, instead of shedding any light on their origins, has made them sound even more mysterious than you did, Eddie.”
“Mother, it is kind of you to invite them, but I would not wish them to be invited to dinner only to be gawked at. Promise me that the dinner will be a small affair, just the family. They are new to town and seem uncertain.”
“Of course, dear. Will you take my invitation to them?” She rose to move toward her desk.
“I can take it, Mother,” Eddie volunteered enthusiastically.
“No, I will deliver the invitation, Eddie,” Rory said dryly. “You have done quite enough today.”
Rory left his mother’s house shortly thereafter and returned home to attend to some business affairs prior to bathing and dressing for dinner.
“And how are the young ladies today, Mr. O’Rourke?” Mrs. Sanford asked as she brought a cup of tea and a small snack into his office.
“Fine, Mrs. Sanford.” Rory looked up with a smile. “I believe they enjoyed the picnic luncheon you prepared immensely—as did my brother, who happened to pop by the park.”
“I’m so pleased,” Mrs. Sanford responded. “Was there a mishap of some sort? Joseph brought in a bag of wet…em…women’s under things and handed them to me with some mention of one of the young ladies falling into the lake? I picked up your clothing for laundering and noted that some of your garments were also slightly damp.”
Rory gave her a wry smile. “Yes, as it happens, there was. At their request, I took the ladies out in a canoe, and Miss Annie St. John tried to stand in the canoe to catch her hat, as I recall, and toppled over into the water. I dove in after her.”
“Mr. O’Rourke! Thank goodness you were there to save her!”
“Oh, I think she would have managed just fine without me. Her skirts hampered her, but she seemed proficient at treading water. I presume she knows how to swim.”
Mrs. Sanford nodded. She bit her lip before speaking. “And the petticoat?” Her eyebrows lifted, and Rory thought he might laugh. Only someone who had been there could understand Annie’s rationale.
“Yes, the petticoat. Well, Miss St. John did not wish to abandon plans for the picnic, wet clothing notwithstanding, and she divested herself of any garment she considered unnecessary at the moment so that her dress might dry faster.” He looked up at Mrs. Sanford from under his lashes, knowing his cheeks had bronzed.
She stared at him pointedly for a moment but said nothing.
Rory chuckled and rubbed his jaw. He felt very much as if he had not one, but two mothers at the moment.
“Yes, I know, Mrs. Sanford. How could I allow such a thing? Why did I not have the good sense to wrap Miss St. John in a blanket and return her to the hotel for a hot bath and change of clothes? How could I allow her to picnic in damp clothing? Did I mention she removed her boots as well? And finally, why should I return her wet clothing to you for laundering?”
“Oh, no, Mr. Sanford, I would never ask the last question regarding laundering. It is my pleasure to wash and dry Miss St. John’s clothing.” She quirked an eyebrow and continued to regard him.
He sighed. “Thank you, Mrs. Sanford. Please do not regard me with that censuring expression. Had it been you there instead of me, I am not certain you could have resisted Miss St. John’s pleas not to abandon the picnic either. I find it hard to deny Miss St. John or her sister anything, as it happens, not that they have asked for much. They are unique.”
Mrs. Sanford softened her features and smiled. “Yes, they are indeed. Have you given any more thought to their origins? To their story of time travel?”
Rory nodded. “I almost convinced myself today that their story was true, but I find the notion of time travel fantastical, and I cannot truly believe that they have traveled through time. Yet everything about them would suggest that they have indeed come from the future, for there seems to be no other explanation for their descriptions of their lives, their mannerisms, language or unfamiliarity with this era.” He shook his head with a sigh. “And if it were true? Will they stay? Miss Marie has stated most emphatically that she would return to wherever she came from immediately if she could. Miss Annie seems ambivalent. I am not always able to understand her thoughts or her emotions.”
“And neither should you, Mr. O’Rourke, if you don’t mind my saying so. She is entitled to her own secrets, her own innermost feelings. You sound quite taken with her, Mr. O’Rourke. Rarely, in my experience, do men wish to ‘understand’ a woman unless they have formed an attachment to her.”
Rory looked up quickly, his cheeks heating.
“As Miss St. John said to me only today, there is that.” He gave Mrs. Sanford a wry smile and nodded. “There is that.”
“Oh, goodness, Mr. O’Rourke.” Mrs. Sanford repeated his sigh. “I wish you the best. I had better leave you to your correspondence. You are dining with the Misses St. John tonight?”
“Yes, and we are all dining with my mother tomorrow night, thanks to my young scallywag of a brother. That is, if Miss St. John and Miss Marie agree. I admit to being nervous about the encounter.”
“They will do well, Mr. O’Rourke. Do not worry. It was inevitable that your mother should hear about them.” Mrs. Sanford chuckled and left his office.
Rory, no longer able to focus on his correspondence and uninterested in eating, leaned back in his chair and stared out the window onto the city below. He wondered what Annie was doing at that moment. Was she resting? Bathing? Perhaps conversing with her sister? He fervently hoped she hadn’t set out on another adventure of wandering the busy streets of Seattle. Two mishaps in one day were more than enough for any one woman. He couldn’t endure the thought of her being trampled under yet another oncoming cart, or worse yet—an automobile or a streetcar.
Rory opened his desk drawer and removed his copy of the photograph he had taken the night before. Smiling with wide lips, the expression in her dark eyes somewhat indecipherable, Annie glowed like a jewel in the photograph, like an opal—warm and soft, yet with sparkling depths if one looked closely.
Underneath the photograph laid his ticket on the SS Minnesota, scheduled to leave for the Orient in two weeks’ time. He was to photograph Japan and China for the next few months. He had no earthly idea how he was going to board a ship and leave Annie behind, perhaps never to see her again if she disappeared as fast as she had come, and yet he couldn’t very well cancel the shoot. The magazine relied upon him.
Rory replaced the photograph in the drawer, laying it on top of the ticket. His seemingly simple life—free of attachment—had become much, much more complicated, and he wasn’t entirely unhappy with the situation. If only he could convince Annie to stay.
Ch
apter Nine
Annie closed the door softly, so as not to awaken Marie, and headed down the hall toward the stairs. She whipped through the lobby and down the hotel steps, shamelessly grabbing a handful of brown serge skirt to lift it above her ankles as she descended. Once at street level, she dropped her skirt and touched her small black and brown-ribboned hat to make sure it was firmly seated on her head before boldly crossing the street with the other pedestrians. It seemed likely that no one suspected she was from the future, nor was anyone about to haul her off to jail for modest dress gaffes, so she lifted her chin and returned the smiles of passersby.
Somehow, she’d gotten the impression that she shouldn’t walk out alone, that it showed some sort of lack of decorum, but she’d seen women walking alone on the streets from her bedroom window, and had seen no reason why she shouldn’t as well. She couldn’t possibly stay cooped up in the room all afternoon—not when there was so much to see in the early twentieth century. Knowing Rory would be displeased, even worried if he knew she strolled the streets alone, she determined not to mention her outing to him.
Seattle in 1906 felt a good deal safer than Chicago in 2013. Annie peered into shop windows and even stepped into a few doorways, but retreated from those quickly when she discovered they were cigar stores. One small shop with a fanciful red and yellow striped awning and hardback books in the window caught her eye, and she entered. It appeared to be a small bookstore, and she nodded to the middle-aged woman on the other side of the counter. No coffee bar hissed as a barista steamed milk, no CDs perched on shelves, no oversized lounge chairs took up floor space. The store was lined with wooden shelves of books. An occasional straight-back wooden chair rested against a wall.
“Do you have a local section?” she asked the saleswoman.
“Local?” the woman repeated.
“Yes, books on Seattle?” Annie said more hesitantly. Was she using the right terminology?