A FINE SPECIMEN OF MANHOOD
1904—St. Louis
Esta looked down at Harte, savoring the way his eyes had gone wide and the color had drained from his cheeks. “Is that what he told you?” she asked, giving the two boys a smile that was all teeth. “That I was supposed to stay put?”
Harte’s mouth was still hanging open in shock, and he had “guilty” written all over him. But really, it served him right, leaving her like he had.
Julien, on the other hand, didn’t looked surprised at all by her appearance. Instead, there was the glint of appreciation in his expression. “He might have said something to that effect.” He nodded in her direction. “This getup—it’s a good look on you. Join us?” he said, gesturing to the empty chair at the table.
Esta sent one more glare in Harte’s direction before taking the offered seat. She removed her hat and faced him straight on, daring him to speak.
He closed his gaping mouth and then opened it again, as though he wanted to say something, but all he did was sputter.
“What is it, Harte?” she asked in a dangerously sweet voice. “You’re not choking on your drink, are you?” She batted her eyes coyly. “Such a shame,” she drawled, pausing for a beat. “Maybe next time.”
Finally, he seemed to find his voice.
He could have asked any number of things—how she’d managed to get clothes when he’d left her half-naked in the room, or how she’d found King’s on her own, for starters—but the first question he asked was the one that probably mattered least of all:
“What did you do to your hair?”
“Do you like it?” Esta asked, blinking mildly at him as she ran her hand down the nape of her bare neck.
“I . . .” Harte was trying to speak, but while his mouth was moving, no words were coming out.
She decided to take that maybe not as approval but as a success. Anyway, she didn’t care much whether he approved or not—it was her head, her hair.
Maybe it had been a moment of madness on her part. At least, that was certainly how it started. When Harte had walked out on her—like he had any right to tell her what to do—weak as she’d felt, all she could do was rage. She might have knocked over the chair, and she’d definitely slammed her fist against the scarred surface of the desk . . . which had hurt more than she’d predicted. It had also jarred the drawer open and revealed a pair of old, rusted shears.
Maybe she hadn’t really been thinking, and maybe she hadn’t really considered the permanence of her actions when she took that first fistful of her hair and hacked through it with the dull blades. But she certainly didn’t regret it.
She’d stood there for a moment with a handful of hair, shocked by her own impulsiveness. In a daze, she’d let the severed strands fall to the floor, and her stomach had fallen right along with them. But then she’d pulled herself together and finished the job—because, really, what else was there to do? She had resolutely ignored the twinge of fear that maybe she was making a mistake. Instead, she’d embraced the racing bite of adrenaline every time another clump of her dark hair fell at her feet.
It was a terrible haircut, ragged and uneven and slightly shorter than a bob, but the more hair that fell, the more weight she felt lifting from her and the more she’d hacked away. After all, it had been the Professor who’d made her keep it long. Growing up, it would have been so much easier to deal with a shorter style on a daily basis as she trained with Dakari or learned her way around the city. But Professor Lachlan didn’t want her in wigs when she slipped through time. Too much of a risk, he’d said. Not authentic enough.
But there wasn’t any Professor Lachlan. There was only Nibsy and the lies he’d built up like a prison around her childhood, hiding the truth of what he was. Of who she was. With every lock she snipped, she’d cut away the weight of her past, freeing herself more and more from those lies.
Then she’d found herself some clothes.
It had been a risk to use her affinity after all that had happened that night, but Harte had left her trapped in the room with nothing but a corset and a pair of lacy drawers. It was either take the risk to venture out or admit that he’d won. She’d been too livid to allow him to win, so she’d used her affinity to sneak out to a neighboring room. She’d waited for the blackness to appear again, but it never did. Which meant that it wasn’t her who was the problem—it was Harte. Or maybe it was the power of the Book, but considering how irritated she was with him, it amounted to the same thing.
“How about you, Julien? Do you like it? I think it suits me.” Esta raised her chin and dared Julien to disagree as the piano player in the corner crescendoed into a run of notes that filled the air with a feverish emotion. The song he was playing sounded the way wanting felt, and it stroked something inside of her, something dark and secret that had yearned for freedom without knowing what freedom truly was.
“It’s a daring choice,” Julien said, smiling into his glass as he took a drink and watching the two of them with obvious amusement.
In reply, Esta shot him a scathing look. She hadn’t cut her hair and bound her breasts and found her own way to King’s for Julien’s entertainment. She was there because she was supposed to be there. Because it was her right to be there. She wasn’t about to allow Harte to discard her like some kind of helpless damsel while he took care of the business that they were supposed to be attending to together. After all, it wasn’t Harte who’d recognized the danger at the hotel earlier. It wasn’t Harte who’d thought fast enough to evade the police waiting for them.
So what if she’d fainted a little after? She’d gotten them out of the Jefferson when Harte had miscalculated in the laundry room. Even with whatever was happening to her affinity, she wasn’t weak. Harte should know that much about her by now. And she shouldn’t have to prove herself—especially not to him.
Yet there she was, sitting in some run-down saloon doing just that. Because she had to send Harte—both of them, really—the message that she wasn’t someone they could just push aside when the boys wanted to play.
Harte leaned over the table toward her and lowered his voice to where she could just barely hear it over the notes of the piano. “You can’t really think this is going to work.”
“I’m fairly certain it already has,” she told him, reaching across to take the glass of amber liquid sitting in front of him. “You’re the only one who seems to be bothered.” Leaning back in her chair, she brought the glass to her lips, satisfied with the flash of irritation that crossed Harte’s face. She took a sip of the tepid liquor, trying not to react as it burned down her throat, searing her resolve.
“She certainly has the bone structure to carry it off,” Julien said, appraising her openly. “And the nerve, apparently.”
“Don’t,” Harte warned Julien. “The last thing I need is for you to encourage this.”
“It doesn’t look like she needs any encouragement,” Julien told Harte, sending a wink in Esta’s direction.
She lifted her glass—a silent salute—in reply.
“If you need some pointers?” Julien said, offering Esta one of the thick black cigars from his inside jacket pocket. “I’d be happy to oblige.”
She waved off the offer of the cigar—the sting of the whiskey was enough for one night. “Pointers?”
“Don’t—” Harte warned again, but they both ignored him this time.
“If you’re going to go through with this little impersonation, I could be of some assistance. You know, I’m something of an expert.” Julien struck a match and let it flare for a second before he lit the cigar she’d just refused, puffing at it until smoke filled the air. He waved his hand to extinguish the flame and tossed the spent match carelessly into the ashtray on the table between them. “For instance, your legs.”
“What’s wrong with my legs?” Esta asked, frowning as she looked down at the dark trousers she’d lifted from the neighboring room. They fit well enough, she thought, examining them critically. They certainly were a lot more comfortable than the skirts she’d been wearing for the past few weeks.
“Men don’t sit like that,” Julien said, exhaling a cloud of smoke that had Esta’s eyes watering. “Women make themselves small. It’s pressed into them, I think. But little boys are taught from birth that the world is theirs. Spread your knees a bit more.”
Esta raised her brows, doubtful. She didn’t need that kind of help.
Understanding her point, he smiled. “Not like that. Like you deserve the space.” He leaned forward, a spark of amusement in those raven’s eyes of his. “Like it’s already yours.”
Julien was right. Even in her own time, the men she’d encountered on buses and in the subway claimed space around them like they had every right to it. That understanding—plus the expression on Harte’s face that warned her not to—had her sliding her knees apart a little. “Like this?”
“Exactly,” Julien said. “Better already.”
“Julien, this is ridiculous,” Harte said, his voice tight.
She had the feeling that if she looked, Harte’s ears would be pink again, but Julien was still watching Esta, and she wasn’t about to be the first one to look away. After a long moment, he turned to Harte. “She’ll be fine. If I could turn you into”—he gestured vaguely in Harte’s direction—“this, then I can teach her just as well.”
“What do you mean?” Esta asked, not missing how Harte’s lips were pressed in a flat line.
“He doesn’t mean anything. Just ignore him,” Harte said, eyeing what was left of the glass of whiskey in her hand like he wanted it.
Julien acted as though Harte hadn’t spoken. “What I mean is that I taught Darrigan everything he knows about becoming the fine specimen of manhood that you see before you today. I even gave him his name.”
“Did you really?” Esta asked, more than a little amused at the silent fury—and embarrassment—etched into Harte’s expression. She tossed back the last of the liquor, just to irritate him.
“Where else do you think he learned it from? You should have seen him the first time he auditioned at the Lyceum. It wasn’t even one of the better houses, you know. Catered mostly to the riffraff who could afford a step above the theaters in the Bowery, but not much more. I’d been working on my own act for a while then and was having a fair amount of success. I happened to be around for auditions one day, and I saw him—”
“Julien,” Harte said under his breath.
“He wasn’t any good?” she asked, leaning forward.
“Oh, the act itself was fine.” Julien looked to Harte. “What was it you did, some sleight of hand or something?”
Harte didn’t answer at first, but realizing that Julien wasn’t going to let it go, he mumbled, “Sands of the Nile.”
“That’s right!” Julien said, snapping his fingers to punctuate his excitement. “He didn’t get to finish, though. The stage manager let him have maybe a minute thirty before he got the hook. You couldn’t blame the guy—anyone could tell what Darrigan was within a second or two of meeting him. You should have heard him then. His Bow’ry bo-hoy twang was as thick as the muck of a city sewer—I could hardly understand him. And it didn’t help that he looked as rough as he sounded . . . like he’d punch the first person who looked sideways at him.”
Esta glanced at Harte, who was quietly seething across the table. “He still looks like that if you know which buttons to push,” she said. Actually, he looks like that right now. Which was fine with her.
“So you helped him?” she asked Julien. “Why?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Julien took another long drag on the cigar, spouting smoke through his nose like some mischievous demon.
Esta suspected that he wasn’t really thinking through the answer. The pauses were too purposeful. It was a fairly ingenious ploy, she had to admit, and one Julien was damn good at—pulling the listener along, making them want to hang on his every word. By the time he finally spoke, even she was aching for his answer.
“I could say that I’m just the sort of kind, benevolent soul that likes to help others—”
Harte huffed out a derisive laugh, but Julien paused long enough so that nothing distracted from the rest of his statement.
“I could say that, but I’ll tell you the truth instead,” he finished, his gaze darting momentarily to Harte. “That day I saw something in him that you can’t teach—I saw presence. Even as untrained and uncouth as he was then, when Darrigan got up on that stage, he commanded it like he was born to walk the boards. There was something unmolded about his talent—something I wanted to have a hand in shaping.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it, Jules,” Harte said, apparently unable to take any more. “You only helped me because you needed someone to take care of the Delancey brothers.” Harte glanced at Esta. “They were a couple of wannabe gangsters in the neighborhood who didn’t understand that Jules’ act was just an act. They’d taken to stalking him after shows, trying to intimidate him to prove what big men they were.”
“I held my own with them,” Julien said stiffly.
“Sure you did, but the rules of the gentleman’s boxing club don’t exactly hold water in the Bowery, and swollen eyes are hard to cover up, even with all the face paint in the world.” Harte shrugged. “So yeah, Jules here taught me how to not look and act like trash from the gutter, and I taught him how to fight dirty so he could get rid of the Delanceys. It’s as simple as that.”
Julien’s expression was drawn. “You know how to ruin a good story, you know that, Darrigan?”
“I’m not here to tell stories,” Harte told him, and then glared at Esta. “And neither is she. We’re here for the necklace.”
Julien frowned, and Esta didn’t miss how he’d blanched a little. “I already told you, I don’t have it.”
“How could you get rid of it after that letter I sent you?” Harte said, his voice low. “Did you miss the part where I asked you to hold on to it for me? To keep it safe?”
“No,” Julien said, his voice going tight. “I understood, but I also believed you’d jumped off a bridge and were supposed to be dead.”
“So you decided to ignore my dying request?” Harte asked.
Julien looked slightly uncomfortable. “I held on to it for so long, and it’s not like I thought you were ever coming back—”
“Enough drama, Jules. Just tell us where it is already,” Harte demanded, a threat coloring his voice.
“Harte,” Esta murmured. “Let him talk.”
Julien sent her an appraising look, less grateful than interested. “Like I said, I did hold on to it. I kept it under lock and key, just like you told me to. But then last winter, Mrs. Konarske, the costume mistress at the theater, created a gown that was practically made for it.”
Harte groaned. “You didn’t.”
“I figured you were dead and gone, and I couldn’t resist.” Julien snubbed what was left of the cigar into the ashtray. “I wore it for less than a week before someone offered to purchase it.”
“You sold it?” Esta asked, her instincts prickling. If Julien had simply sold the necklace, it meant that it wasn’t lost. She was a thief; she’d just steal it back.
“I didn’t really have a choice.” From Julien’s uneasy expression, Esta knew there was something more he wasn’t saying. “Anyway, if it makes you feel any better, I haven’t worn the gown since.” He sounded almost disappointed.
“I don’t care about your costume, Jules. I need to know who you sold the necklace to.” Harte’s eyes were sharp and determined.
“That’s the thing.” Julien looked up at Harte, waiting a beat before he spoke again. “I have no idea.”
Harte swore at him until Esta kicked him under the table. As frustrated as she was with Julien, they needed him on their side, and at the rate Harte was going, he was going to say something he wouldn’t be able to take back.
“You must have some idea of who purchased it,” she said more gently. “Even if you don’t know who the buyer was, someone had to have given you the money and taken the stone.”
“Oh, of course there was an exchange,” Jules agreed. “But that doesn’t mean I know who it was that made it.”
Esta could practically feel Harte’s impatience. “Stop talking nonsense, Jules.”
“I didn’t sell the necklace to a person.” Julien’s voice was calm and even, and he paused to take a long swallow of whiskey.
“I’m not getting any younger,” Harte said through clenched teeth.
But Julien refused to be rushed. It was a master class of a confidence game. He leaned forward, his dark eyes ringed with the reflection of the lamp on the table between them. “If you’re thinking of getting it back, you might as well forget it,” he said softly, pausing to draw the moment out. “Because I sold it to the Veiled Prophet.”