AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yes. Thank you for your help. I think I shall be all right now.”
She was at the head of the queue, and the driver of the hansom jumped down to take her valise.
“In that case, Miss Copley, will you have dinner with me tonight? I do not wish to end our association so quickly. Allow me the pleasure of your company, and to hear more of your drawings.”
The invitation was so charming and heartfelt, it tore at Ellen to refuse. She didn’t really want to say no, yet surely she could not dine unescorted and alone with a strange man, in a strange city.
“I fear, Mr. McAvoy,” she said, “that would not be appropriate.”
A faint blush tinted his pale cheeks as he smiled in apology. “Of course, I quite see what you mean. I don’t mean to be forward—perhaps you could see it as a matter of business? As a Governor of the Glasgow School of Art, I take particular interest in your talent.”
/> “I find that hard to believe.”
“A sign of your own humility, then. I told you not to sell yourself short. I’m staying at the Congress Hotel on Michigan Avenue—they have a pleasant restaurant, plenty of diners to serve as chaperones.” His smile was winsome and just a tiny bit rakish, mockingly so, that Ellen found herself laughing.
She was in a strange city, no one knew her, so she could do as she pleased. She knew she would conduct herself with propriety, and she believed Henry McAvoy would as well. And she didn’t need to play it safe anymore, did she?
“All right, Mr. McAvoy, in light of your fine arguments, I accept.”
“Where to, miss?” The driver asked, and Ellen told him her address. Henry McAvoy spoke briefly to the driver, and then helped Ellen into the hansom. “I’ve arranged for the driver to bring you to the Congress Hotel at seven o’clock, and return you to your hotel at nine. Is that suitable?”
“Perfectly.” Ellen suppressed both a laugh and a thrill of pleasurable anticipation. Henry McAvoy was clearly a man who got things done. And as for the Glasgow School of Art... she could not even begin to think about that.
That evening Ellen entered the foyer of the elegant Congress Hotel with more than a little trepidation. After some consideration, she’d dressed in her rose wool. Although it was too warm for the season, she had nothing else suitable—the store bought dress from Hamish was dirty from the train, and the gown she’d worn to Lucas’ smoker was packed in a trunk back in her bedroom on Jasper Lane. She thought of the ruffled silk with a little longing, and then shrugged. Henry McAvoy was obviously a gentleman of fine tastes and some wealth. Ellen could hardly hope to impress him, no matter what she wore.
Not, she told herself sternly, that she was trying to impress him at all.
The Congress Hotel was an imposing building, boasting, the cabby told her, a thousand guest rooms. It seemed an impossible number to Ellen, and yet the building certainly seemed large enough to hold such a vast amount of people.
The lobby of the hotel was large and luxurious, with sumptuous carpeting and sparkling chandeliers. Ellen saw that there was even a grand piano in one corner. She’d never seen such elegance and she looked around uncertainly for Mr. McAvoy, already feeling out of her depth.
“Miss Copley! I’m so glad you came.” She turned around at the sound of his voice; he stood before her, his dark hair slicked back, dressed in an excellently cut evening suit.
Ellen smiled, pleasure and anticipation unfurling within her. “Did you think I wouldn’t?”
“I wondered,” Henry admitted. “After taking my leave of you, I realized the boldness of my invitation. The last thing I want is for you to be uncomfortable.”
“I’m not,” Ellen lied, for her sumptuous surroundings, as well as the elegant figure Henry McAvoy cut, were already making her feel a bit gauche and stupid. She smiled again. “This certainly is better than the modest fare offered at my boarding house.”
“The food here is excellent,” Henry confided as, with one hand on her elbow, he led her into the dining room.
After they were seated at a table for two, crisp linen napkins laid on their laps by the white jacketed waiters, Henry turned his dark gaze on Ellen.
“What takes you to Santa Fe, Miss Copley?”
“I’m visiting my father.”
“He lives there?”
“He works on the railway.” As soon as she said it, Ellen realized how poor that sounded to someone as wealthy and well-connected as Henry McAvoy seemed to be. She pursed her lips in a frown. Why was he dining with her this evening? Slumming with a working class girl? Or could he really be interested in her little sketches? It seemed impossible, ridiculous.
“You must be looking forward to seeing him,” Henry said smoothly, ignoring the awkward pause that Ellen’s admission had created. “Has it been some time?”
“Six years. I’ve been living with my aunt and uncle.” Ellen did not want to talk about Amherst Island, or Ruth and Hamish. A lump of homesickness had lodged in her chest like a stone and she was afraid if she started describing the places she’d been, the people she loved, she would shame herself by weeping or worse.
Instead she glanced around the dining room, the light glinting off the crystal chandeliers and wine glasses, and wondered how she would sketch such a scene.
At the table next to them a woman in ivory silk and diamonds looked exquisitely bored. Ellen drew her in her mind in a few quick strokes—the way she propped her chin in her hand and gazed irritably at her surroundings, impressed by nothing.
