She hands him a red wool scarf, the one she has been knitting on and off. It is longer than Bailey expected from watching her knit, with intricate patterns of knotted cables at each end.
“I can’t accept this,” he says, part of him deeply honored and the other part wishing people would stop giving him things.
“Nonsense,” Elizabeth says. “I make them all the time, I am at no loss for yarn. I started this one with no particular rêveur in mind to wear it, so clearly it is meant for you.”
“Thank you,” Bailey says, wrapping the scarf around his neck despite the warmth of the train.
“You are quite welcome,” Elizabeth says. “We should be arriving soon enough, and then it will only be a matter of waiting for the sun to set.”
She leaves him in his seat by the window. Bailey stares out at the grey sky with a mixture of comfort and excitement and nervousness that he cannot reconcile.
When they arrive in New York, Bailey is immediately struck by how strange everything looks. Though it is not that different from Boston, Boston had some passing familiarity. Now, without the comforting lull of the train, it strikes him how very far he is from home.
Victor and Lorena seem equally discombobulated, but Elizabeth is on familiar ground. She ushers them through intersections and herds them onto streetcars until Bailey begins to feel like one of his sheep. But it does not take long for them to reach their destination, a spot outside the city proper where they are to meet up with another local rêveur named August, the same whose room Bailey had inherited in Boston, who has graciously invited them to stay with him at his home until they can find rooms elsewhere.
August turns out to be a pleasant, heavyset fellow and Bailey’s first impression is that he resembles his house: a squat sort of building with a porch wrapping around the front, warm and welcoming. He practically lifts Elizabeth off the ground in greeting and shakes hands so enthusiastically while being introduced to Bailey that his fingers are sore afterward.
“I have good news and bad news,” August says as he helps them lift their bags onto the porch. “Which should come first?”
“The good,” Elizabeth answers before Bailey has time to consider which would be preferable. “We have traveled too long to be met with bad news straight off.”
“The good news,” August says, “is that I was indeed correct in predicting the exact location and Le Cirque has set up less than a mile away. You can see the tents from the end of the porch if you lean properly.” He points down the left side of the porch from where he stands on the stairs.
Bailey rushes to the end of the porch with Lorena close on his heels. The tops of the striped tents are visible through the trees some distance away, a bright punch of white against grey sky and brown trees.
“Wonderful,” Elizabeth says, laughing at Lorena and Bailey as they lean over the railing. “And what is the bad news, then?”
“I’m not certain it is bad news, precisely,” August says, as though he is not sure how to explain. “Perhaps more disappointing, really. Regarding the circus.”
Bailey steps down from the railing and turns back to the conversation, all the elation he had felt moments before draining away.
“Disappointing?” Victor asks.
“Well, the weather is not ideal, as I’m certain you’ve noticed,” August says, gesturing up at the heavy grey clouds. “We had quite a storm last night. The circus was closed, of course, which was odd to begin with as in all my time I have never seen it set up only to be closed the first night for inclement weather. Regardless, there was some sort of, I don’t even know what t
o call it, a noise of some sort around midnight. A crashing sound that practically shook the house. I thought perhaps something had been struck by lightning. There was a great deal of smoke over the circus, and one of the neighbors swears he saw a flash of light bright as day. I took a walk down there this morning and nothing appears to be amiss, though the closure sign is still up on the gates.”
“How strange,” Lorena remarks.
Without a word Bailey leaps over the porch railing and takes off in a full run through the trees. He heads toward the striped tents as fast as he can, his red scarf trailing out behind him.
Old Ghosts
LONDON, OCTOBER 31, 1902
It is late and the pavement is dark despite the streetlamps dotting the line of grey stone buildings. Isobel stands near the shadowed stairs of the one she called home for almost a year, what now seems like a lifetime ago. She waits outside for Marco to return, a pale blue shawl pulled around her shoulders like a patch of day-bright sky in the night.
Hours pass before Marco appears at the corner. His grip on his briefcase tightens when he sees her.
“What are you doing here?” he asks. “You’re supposed to be in the States.”
“I left the circus,” Isobel said. “I walked away. Celia said I could.”
She takes a faded scrap of paper from her pocket, bearing her name, her real name that he coaxed from her years ago and asked her to write in one of his notebooks.
“Of course she did,” Marco says.
“May I come upstairs?” she asks, fidgeting with the edge of her shawl.