Those boys needed her.
XX
That night, Mirabella lingered in a bath until the water cooled. She lay in the big tub and formulated the argument she meant to have with Paolo—and no doubt it would be an argument. Not only did she ignore his instruction not to go to the basement, but the thing she’d decided she wanted to make of her own was part of his world.
She wanted to help him shape the boys—and the girls—in his charge. They clearly needed her. The boys were mostly left to themselves to learn and work, and the girls were sheltered in a bordello, of all things. They all needed another influence in their lives.
It was perfect, in her mind. A way for her to become fully part of his life and to know exactly what that life was, without actually standing at his side while he made his deals.
Though she understood why he’d want to keep his business out from between them, she didn’t want to be left out in the cold. She could be a help to him; she could teach the boys who became his men how to be civilized in a civilized world.
And she could advise him. She already had—he’d turned down an invitation to a New Year’s Eve celebration at yet another grand house near Central Park because she’d convinced him he didn’t need those stuffy fools to make of himself and his business what he wanted. There would be no more awkward ‘events’ where he was shunted off to a corner.
When the water was cool enough to make her shiver, she climbed from the tub and finished her evening routine, letting her hair down from its coil atop her head and easing her wide-toothed comb through it before she brushed her teeth and added a few dabs of the citron scent Paolo loved at her nape and wrists, between her breasts, and low on her belly.
She wrapped herself in the red silk dressing gown he’d given her and went to the bedroom.
He was sitting up in bed, reading a book, wearing a set of round spectacles that made him look like a scholar. Ridiculous, how alluring those gold frames were to her.
He didn’t look up from his book as she came in. He’d been distracted and a bit glum all evening, but the cause had to do with his business, so she didn’t know what it was.
She didn’t recognize the book he read, either. “What do you read?” she asked in English.
Learning English was like building a brick wall someone knocked down each night while she slept. Every time she thought she was beginning to achieve a real fluency, something set her back. It was hard to believe that she might ever learn to think in English and no longer need to translate each word as she went. Paolo said he did it—he shifted back and forth between the languages with ease, and thought in the one he was using.
He looked up at her, then down at the cover of his new book—a slim volume bound in red leather. “The Art of War. Someone I met with today gave it to me. He said it would give me good wisdom.”
“Does it?”
He watched her slip off her dressing gown and slide into bed beside him.
“I don’t know. I haven’t read far enough yet. It’s an odd book—more like a list of ideas.” He closed the book and set it aside, laying his spectacles on top. “You’re more interesting.”
As he rolled to her, she smiled and set her hand on his chest, holding him back from his greedy grab. “I want a talk first, Paolo. I know what to have for mine.”
“Yes? Good.” He pushed against her hand, slipped his arm around her, and drew her close. “Tell me in Italian.”
She cast off English like a hair shirt. “I want to teach your orphans.”
He’d tucked his face against her neck, tasting her, before she finished her sentence. Once the words were said, he went still, then lifted up and leaned back. “What?”
“The boys in the basement—I saw them today.”
“I told you to stay away from the basement. I don’t want you around those boys.”
“Why not? Are you afraid for me, or for them?”
Now he let her go and returned to his side of the bed. “I told you no. Those boys are my business, not yours.”
“But why, Paolo?”
He stared forward, fixed on the covers over his legs. “Do you know what those boys do, what they’re learning?”
“No. Because you won’t tell me, and neither would they.”
“Because they’re my business.”
“Are they slaves, then?”
His attention whipped to her; his eyes showed heat. Anger. “No. I will never keep a slave. The boys choose. When they’re old enough to go out on their own, they choose. If they want to go, I don’t stand in their way.”
“So why can’t I know them?”
“I have told you why. You won’t listen.”
“I won’t listen because it makes no sense. They’re just boys. They were gentlemen today.”
He made a derisive snort. “They are not gentlemen.”
“And I am not a lady. They treated me with respect, Paolo—and you, too. They told me nothing that was yours to keep secret.”
Except for his eyes, his expression showed little. But Mirabella had known him for months, she’d been as close to him as anyone for weeks, and she was getting to really know him, despite his best efforts to guard himself from insight. She turned and set her hand on his. “Paolo. What I want—they needn’t tell me of their work, or yours. But they are left to their own devices too much. You don’t make them go to school.”
Paolo began to interrupt, and Mirabella put her hand up to stop them. “The older boys teach the younger, I know. But they don’t teach well. Those boys can hardly read. They’re good at numbers, but not reading or writing. I can teach them, Paolo. And what of the girls, spending their days in a bordello? Do you not see why that is a bad way to grow up?”
He was defensive now. He crossed his arms. “Those children were on the streets. That’s a bad way to grow up. I give them food, shelter, and safety. And Carmela is a good woman. That bordello is a good one. Clean and safe. I see to it.”
“It’s still a bordello, Paolo. That’s all those girls see of womanhood as they grow up.”
“Carmela is the only one I knew who would care for them.”
“Now you know me.”
“What is it you want?” His tone was grudging, but Mirabella focused on the promise in the words.
“I want to teach them.”
“You’re not fluent in English yourself yet, Bella. How will you teach them?”
“It’s not only reading and writing. We can learn that together. But I do know how to read a story to understand it, and how to write to be understood. In any language, those are the same. And I taught you how to behave among society—can’t you see a value in your ‘boys’ having good manners?”
“And the girls? If you want me to house them somewhere else, that’s not possible. My resources are stretched thin right now, Bella. My Long Island project is taking everything I can spare.”
She’d wondered if that weren’t the cause, or part of the cause, of his distracted mood of late. His spending habits had never been wildly extravagant, but he’d spent like a wealthy man, especially relative to the other residents of this part of the city. She couldn’t say he’d been economizing recently, but he had seemed faintly more reluctant to spend—and a bit gloomy regarding his work.
“No. If the bordello is clean and safe, they should stay. But they need another influence, don’t you think?”
“And you think The Whore of the Beast should be that influence?”
For a moment, Mirabella was too stunned to respond. Paolo often insisted that he wasn’t cruel, that his kind of violence was not cruel because it was, in his mind, deserved. Brutality was not cruelty, he said. For the most part, she allowed him that distinction.
What he’d just said to her, however, in a blithely conversational tone, was pure cruelty.
And she was badly hurt.
He seemed to realize belatedly that his words had struck blood and bone.
“Bella …” he said, and reached for her.
She snatc
hed her hand back. “Fuck you, Beast.” With that, she jumped from the bed, snatched up her dressing gown and yanked it on as she fled the room.
It didn’t matter where she was going, barefoot and wearing nothing but a silk robe. He’d hurt her, and she wanted away.
He chased her down and caught her before she reached the door. “Bella, stop. I didn’t meant it as it sounded.”
Turning on him, she snarled, “How else could you mean it?”
As she asked, she slammed her hands to his chest and shoved. His chest was bare—in fact, he was naked. He’d jumped from the bed and hadn’t slowed to grab his own dressing gown. She slammed his chest again.
“Stop!” he shouted as she struggled to get free of him. “Now!”
He rarely shouted, and never at her. She stopped fighting and said, “You think me a whore.”
“I don’t. But you know it’s said about you. We’ve talked of it. My point is that you are known that way. It’s not fair, and it’s not true, but gossip is gossip, Bella. Nowhere on earth is as full of gossip—especially the kind that comes from jealousy—as a whorehouse. Those girls will know you by that name.”
“Then they already know me by that name.”
“Likely, yes.”
“It would be better to show them the truth, no?”
He stared at her, the ‘thinking’ crease between his brows deep. “This is what you want? The thing that is yours?”
She nodded. “This is what I want. I can be a help to you in this way, Paolo. I can be your solace in these rooms, and a help to you outside them.”
“If I say yes, you cannot talk of my work with them. You can school them, and teach them manners. You can teach Italian to those who don’t speak it. But if you snoop into my business, there is no deal we can strike to balance that betrayal. Do you understand, Mirabella?”
She’d won. He wasn’t so difficult to reason with if you knew how to do it—and the first step was to know that simple reason rarely worked. To get Paolo to reconsider a decision he’d made, one had to shake him up first. He needed a fight.
“I understand. I would never betray you, Paolo.”
“Then we can try it your way.”
She didn’t want to smile. She wanted to show him she was as cool as he. But the smile broke over her face despite her best effort to hold it back. “Thank you.”
His mouth twitched, and he coughed out a half-formed chuckle. “Good. Now come back to bed, woman. Your wild temper makes me hard.”
A downward glance showed he spoke true.
Oh yes, she understood this man.
And loved him with her whole heart.
The Christmas holidays were a bit different in America than in Italy. They started and ended a bit earlier; the Italian tradition followed the Catholic liturgy, while Americans made merry from their holiday of Thanksgiving to the first day of the new year. Instead of the witch La Befana, they had Santa Claus. And there was, overall, a greater focus on gifts, with children expecting great mounds of wrapped packages from Santa. In Italy, La Befana brought a tokens for children on the Epiphany, but the holiday was more reverent than it seemed here.
In Little Italy, populated by immigrants who remembered the ways of the old country and held them dear, Christmas was a blend of old and new.
For the most part, Paolo ignored the bustle of the holidays, but when she’d told him she wanted to go uptown, where everyone said the best decorations could be found, he’d taken her. She had been dazzled by light and color in shop windows transformed into magical wonders.
Little Italy had little such magic.
Snow had fallen on and off for the better part of a week. For the first few days it was lovely, but eventually the grime of the city took over, leaving streets covered in black sludge and the snowbanks crusted in soot and grime. High winds had torn at the pine ropes, ribbons, and wreaths, leaving them tattered and half bald. The streets looked far more weary than festive.
But Christmas Eve was still a happy time. The neighborhood bustled through the day as people made last minute purchases of food and drink. Mirabella had heard of a great celebration up Mulberry Street, but Paolo said he and his family would not be welcomed there.
Instead, he held a celebration of his own, for those unwelcome souls. All of Christmas Eve was spent in preparation. Mirabella had gone back to the kitchen to see if she could help, but Leonora, Paolo’s cook, shooed her away. Not with malice, but with deference. The don’s lady couldn’t possibly lower herself to work in the kitchen, she said.
Maria, the housekeeper, felt no such deference, but she didn’t want Mirabella’s help, either. So Mirabella went down to the basement for an hour or so to work with the boys.
Late in the morning, Paolo and Aldo carried in a huge fir tree and propped it up in front of the window. Nello and Joey brought several wood crates from a room at the back of the house. The crates turned out to hold ornaments and garlands. Then the men sat down with whiskey and watched as Mirabella and Maria decorated the tree.
Mirabella had endeavored to find a truce with Maria. She hadn’t yet succeeded, but in front of Paolo, Maria was sweetness and light.
As they circled the tree, hanging bright glass from the boughs, Mirabella started to hum. She hadn’t realized she was until Paolo, sitting nearby, said, “Will you sing for us, Bella?”
It pleased her that he’d asked, and the tone with which he had—low and private—pleased her more. So she did. But not like she’d sung at the March house. Here, she sang simple carols and holiday hymns. Songs they all knew. After a few bars, Aldo joined in. He had a lovely basso voice, and joined her in harmony. Eventually, they were all singing. All but Paolo.
Mirabella felt a keen homesickness—her first Natale away from Italy—but also an equally keen sense of belonging. For the very first time, this strange building, which was home and business, meeting place and orphanage, felt like her home, and her strange relationship with the man of the house felt like something real. Something that could last.
As a song ended she turned to Paolo and found his eyes on her. She smiled. He didn’t. But he didn’t need to. His stoic face was the new language she’d learned best.
He felt it, too.
That evening, when the tree was decorated and the parlor arranged with an array of small tables and chairs and a long buffet table nearly groaning with good food—a roast turkey, a baked ham, and three different fish dishes; six different bowls of pasta, gnocchi, and risotto; baskets of fresh breads, boards of good cheese, two large trays of roasted squashes; and several bottles of wine—Paolo opened the doors. The boys from below came up. The whores from down the street came, and brought the young girls in their care with them. Mirabella hadn’t had a chance yet to get to know the girls, but she would. For now, she was struck by how well cared for they were—everyone clean and tidily dressed.
Aldo and his wife came, and Nello and his. Joey came.
And Mirabella’s father came.
He seemed a bit unsettled, celebrating among the rabble of the Five Points, but Mirabella was here, and he had nowhere else to go.
Paolo treated him as an honored guest, and as an elder—with solicitous respect.
He treated all those children and young people with respect as well. Mirabella had never seen him interact with them before this day. They were part of his work, and he kept her out of it. But now she watched carefully and saw how they treated him, and vice versa.
He was kind to them. He listened when they spoke, and gave good counsel when they asked. And they were obviously devoted to him. Not the fearful, grudging devotion of people with no other choice, but truly devoted.
He was no Fagin, driving poor orphans into lives of crime and taking advantage of their need for his own profit. He took away their need, gave them a skill, and let them decide if they wanted the life he offered.
The people who called Paolo the Beast had never known him. They’d seen only the consequences for those who’d crossed him.
&
nbsp; Mirabella had once thought of him that way, and despised him. Now she knew him, and loved him.
“He is a better man than I knew,” her father said, speaking her own thought aloud. He had come up beside her as she watched Paolo, who crouched at the side of young Ollie, who was only seven and had been living here for three years. Ollie was telling him what appeared to be a very elaborate and serious story.
“He is. Pappa, I love him.” It was the first time she’d said so to anyone other than Paolo—and to him, she’d said the words only once. Neither of them had said them again.
Her father sighed. “You will make a hard life for yourself with him, Mira. This is what you want?”
“It is.”
He squeezed her arm. “Then I am happy for you. You have my support, always. You know that, yes?”
Not for a single moment in her life had it ever mattered that this man was not the man who’d made her. He was the only father she’d ever known or ever wanted, and he’d never treated her as anything less than his very own daughter and precious treasure.
“I do, Pappa. I love you.”
After a big meal, during which Mirabella had circulated the room, enforcing a policy of good manners—once or twice with a light smack upside a head and a smiling but stern rebuke to go with it—they played games, and Mirabella led the room in carols. Then Aldo came in, dressed in a red velvet and white fur suit, carrying a large green cloth sack. He sat near the fireplace and its crackling fire and chortled, “Ho ho ho!” over and over as the youngest children clambered to sit on his lap. Each one had their turn and got a small wrapped gift.
Mirabella saw Paolo circulating among the older children and teenagers, handing each one a small envelope and getting a deep, grateful nod in return. Tokens for his charges too old for toys. The adults got envelopes, too. Thicker ones.
Her heart would soon explode for love of this man and this strange, rambling family he’d made. A man with no one had gathered to him every other castoff he could find and made them all whole.
She saw her father approach Paolo and, acting first from a sense of protectiveness, though she wasn’t sure to whom it was directed, made her way through the crowd to them both. As she neared, Paolo held out his hand for her. When she took it, he pulled her close.
Il Bestione (The Golden Door Duet Book 2) Page 25