Chapter Five
Five
Henry might have succeeded in convincing himself that none of this was real…had he not been acutely aware of Rose’s physical presence, in every detail. The bronze-brown curls cascading over her shoulders. The fragrance she wore, like incense and roses.
If he were dreaming, why did he not dream of Charlotte herself, as he had done countless times? Why would he dream of a woman who was so…uncivilized?
And yet, her charms were not small. In her presence, he felt jolted back to life again, like Frankenstein’s monster.
He should not be feeling that way. Even if she was real, she was certainly not Charlotte.
Seeing messages appear on the sleek tablet in her hand, though, had given him an uncanny feeling. This is not a dream, a voice inside him had warned. Be careful!
If this were really happening, he should not be alone with her in her rooms in the middle of the night, not that it had been his choice. It was hardly respectable.
“One tea coming right up,” she said.
While she busied herself in the kitchen, from which he heard odd chirping noises, he idly picked up a pile of papers on the table in her sitting room.
Advertisements for strange goods and services: Pizza?
An oil change? She returned much more quickly than he had expected, with two large mugs instead of teacups.
“Are you reading my mail?” she asked, teasing.
“I did not know it was mail,” he defended himself as she handed him one of the mugs. A little tag on a string hung on the rim.
“What is this thing?” he blurted out, tugging at it.
“What?…The tea bag?” She plucked an object out by the string, did the same with her own, and deposited two little wet bags on the letter.
He stared down at them, then took a cautious sip. “It is satisfactory.”
She gave him a bright smile. “Wow! And here I was just going for tolerable.”
“But I take it with cream,” he said mildly. She would be mortified, he was sure, that she had failed to offer him either cream or sugar.
She shrugged. “Best I can do is some oat milk.”
“Enough of these foolish jests,” he said. “You cannot extract milk from oats.”
“Sure you can. Just squeeze them really hard,” she said, pressing her finger and thumb together. Then she giggled.
“I will drink it without,” Henry said, slightly miffed.
“Sorry it’s not high tea at the Drake,” she teased. “I’m not very proper here.”
That gave him, he realized, the opportunity to raise the matter much on his mind. He cleared his throat slightly.
“Speaking of propriety, perhaps I should leave after this cup of tea, before your neighbors wake.”
He hadn’t necessarily expected her to blush—she was cavorting about in a state of dishabille, after all—but he’d at least expected her to say something along the lines of, Yes, you’re quite right.
Instead, she blinked at him. “Why?” While he tried to think of the delicate way to say, So that everyone won’t think you’re a whore, she added in confusion, “Where do you want to go?”
“If I met you in a public park, in the daytime hours, taking in the fresh air, that is…” He was rambling. “No one could suspect you of an improper association.” To his chagrin, although he considered himself a man of the world, he was the one who was blushing.
She laughed. “Henry, how do I put this? These days, it’s not a big deal to do it with someone you’re not married to.”
He had a strong suspicion about what it meant to do it. Perhaps he should’ve reminded her that they were not nearly well enough acquainted to address each other by first names, but what was the point, when she spoke of such shocking things?
He stood holding his mug of tea in front of him like a shield. “Surely, your family would not approve.”
“My parents…aren’t with us anymore.” Sorrow shadowed her face. “It’s just me and my brother.”
Regret settled in the pit of Henry’s stomach. He should have ascertained, through pleasant and not too prying comments and questions, her family situation. That was what one did, if one had any conversational skill.
He said, “You have my heartfelt sympathy, Miss Novak, in the great loss you have suffered.”
She gave him a wistful smile that seemed designed to melt his heart. “Thank you. It was a long time ago, but I miss them every day. I know you understand.”
He nodded. “But we must still take care for your reputation.”
She laughed again and perched on the arm of the chair. “Nobody’s worried about my virtue, promise. And I mean, that ship has already sailed.”
Impudent woman. “I cannot imagine your brother would be pleased by my presence here.”
“My brother’s going to think this is amazing. And hilarious.”
Henry stared at her. “But why would he be amused? A young woman’s close association with gentlemen would lower her value as a future wife.”
Her face screwed up into an expression of disgust, and she held up her hands, even though she held a mug in one of them. “Okay, none of that manosphere bullshit. Being with men doesn’t lower my value. I’m a woman, not a purse on Poshmark!”
He frowned. “I was speaking of a universally held belief! I perceive that I have greatly offended you, but I have not the slightest conception of why.” Nor did he know the meaning of manosphere, which might have been an astronomical term, or Poshmark.
Her expression softened. “It’s okay. Things have changed a lot since your time.”
She forgave quickly, even in the absence of an apology—and even though it had been quite clear that his words had been extremely distasteful to her.
Perhaps he should leave it at that. But his ever-present compulsion to learn how the world worked won out over his sense of propriety, which seemed to be a foreign currency to her, anyway.
He considered sitting down, but was not sure of the etiquette, as she was not quite sitting down herself. “But Miss Novak, if anyone may…associate amorously, outside the bounds of marriage, are ladies not often left with the burden of raising children alone?”
“That happens sometimes,” she admitted. “But weren’t there some unmarried mothers in your time, too? Ones who should’ve been getting help from the children’s father?”
“I am sure there has been no era in which all men fulfilled their moral duties.”
“But right now, women can take medicine so they don’t get pregnant.
” While he repeated this in his head to make sure he’d clearly heard such an astonishing claim, she added, “I take the pill now, even though I don’t have a boyfriend, because otherwise I get the worst period cramps. I mean a solid week every month.”
Was she talking about what he thought she was talking about? He could think of no other interpretation. His ears grew hot and he looked away. But along with his embarrassment, he felt something unexpected: a wrong and reckless pleasure in transgression.
“Do you always speak freely with men about such matters?” he managed to ask.
She laughed. “Not constantly, but sure, if it comes up.”
Until he’d been married to Charlotte, his basic understanding of the courses of females had not included the knowledge that it caused considerable pain.
There hadn’t been much that he could do about her monthly distress, but he’d encouraged her to lie in bed reading novels as much as she liked during that time, and had instructed the kitchen to keep her favorite rum cake on hand.
“I’m sorry,” Rose said sincerely. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you. I think we’re both doing the best we can here.”
He supposed they were. “My curiosity has proven a distraction, as it often does. What I truly must know is this: How can I return, as soon as possible, to where I belong?”
She winced as if this was an impossible question, and Henry feared that it very well might be.
Then she said, “Let’s go out on the roof.”
“The roof?” he repeated, bewildered.
“That’s where I like to sit when I’m trying to figure things out,” she said, walking over to the door from which she’d first emerged. “It’s the main reason I rented this place.”
He gave a huff of surprise. “At Everly Park, there were windows one could climb out of to walk on the roof on either the West or East Court. But I have not done such a thing since I was a boy.”
She cast him a mischievous look over her shoulder. “Then it’s about time you did it again.”
He did want to look more at this town of Chicago—dream, hallucination, or real. “Very well.”
When he followed her into the next room and saw her large bed with several pillows, he felt another tiny jolt.
He was hardly accustomed to entering ladies’ bedchambers.
Surely this bare-legged, whimsical Cyprian was attempting to seduce him?
Maybe that was why she’d encouraged such salacious conversation?
But she walked right past the bed and the nightstand next to it, which held cards, curious objects, and the remains of a small pink candle. “This story is smaller than the one below it,” she explained. “We can climb out here.”
She set her mug of tea down long enough to open the window, then picked it up again. He stared, dumbfounded, at her plump, dimpled thighs as she straddled the sill and then hopped onto the roof on the other side.
Henry remembered to breathe again. It was the most ungainly, unladylike thing he’d ever witnessed. And the most seductive. What was it about this woman that had his body twitching ever so slightly to life?
It was nothing about her, personally, he decided.
When was the last time he’d been alone in the company of a pretty woman?
Certainly not since Charlotte had died. Well, yes, there had been the maids, but he was not a reprobate.
And he’d spent a long evening with a clever lady at the Paris Observatory, who was said to be pretty, as well, and he’d felt nothing…
but she had been a fellow scientist, so it didn’t count.
No, he was only reacting to Rose’s chaotic charms out of deprivation. A hungry man always declared the food was delicious.