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Listen to the mockingbird, listen to the mockingbird,
the mockingbird still singing o’er her grave,
Listen to the mockingbird, listen to the mockingbird,
still singing where the weeping willows wave…
Thirty-two earnest voices rose in wan, warbling unison as the members of the East Side Temperance Society sang the last song on the program of their Saturday singalong, hosted by Miss Adelaide Drayton in the shady back garden of her Washington Square townhouse.
And though Mary Munro sang, too, she did so half-heartedly.
She did not like “Listen to the Mockingbird.” She’d never been able to reconcile the song’s cheerful melody with the subject of its lyrics—young Halley, who’d died and was buried in a valley under willow trees—and she wondered now, as she did every time she heard it, if the person who’d written it had actually ever lost a loved one.
“Ah, one of my favorites!” Milton Duffery exclaimed, after the last notes of the song rose and faded.
He drew out a handkerchief and mopped his brow. Then he removed his jacket and draped it over the back of his wicker chair. His exertions wafted the scent of his cologne through the air. Mary could not place it, though it seemed to contain notes of menthol and, strangely, mustard.
“I shall fetch us some lemonade,” he said to Mary, then turned to the elderly woman seated at his right. “Miss Drayton, may I bring you a glass, too?”
“Thank you, Mr. Duffery, that would be lovely.”
Milton Duffery rose, then made his way toward the refreshments table, leaving Mary sitting with Miss Drayton.
“Such a considerate man,” Miss Drayton said.
“Yes, he is,” Mary agreed.
Milton Duffery had been most attentive to Mary all evening.
He’d introduced her to the other members of the temperance society, found her a seat in the shade, and when supper had been served, he’d squired her through the line, putting a large piece of fried chicken on her plate, selecting a biscuit for her, dishing up generous helpings of aspic and salad.
Generous? Hah. All he’s doing is being free with someone else’s food! a voice inside her head scoffed, a man’s voice, Irish and cheeky. And if I were you, missus, I’d have handed it right back. Chicken was as tough as tar paper and the biscuit tasted like a cow pat.
Mary quickly silenced the voice. It had been kind of Milton Duffery to invite her to the singalong, and kind of the other members to welcome her.
And if they talked non-stop about the evils of drink…
well, what did she expect at a temperance society event?
And if everyone was terribly serious and no one ever laughed…
well, perhaps that was how peop le who did not live in Hell’s Kitchen conducted themselves.
And if their tastes in music tended toward sad and mournful tunes, toward the—
Bloody funereal! the voice cut in. Jaysus, is this a singalong or a wake?
“Enough!” Mary hissed under her breath. The voice went quiet, though she wondered how long it would stay that way.
Miss Drayton, slight and straight-backed in a high-necked dress, stared ahead of herself at a late-flowering dogwood.
She hummed a few bars of “Listen to the Mockingbird,” a blue-veined hand tapping out time on the arm of her chair, then turned to Mary and said, “It’s a strange song, is it not, Mrs. Munro? ”
“Why, yes, it is, Miss Drayton,” Mary said smiling, surprised that her hostess’s thoughts mirrored her own. “I’ve always thought so.”
She leaned across the little table between them, the better to hear Miss Drayton. Perhaps she was a kindred spirit. Perhaps their conversation would take an interesting, maybe even uplifting, turn. Mary hoped so. She could do with a bit of cheerfulness.
“It’s a deceptive tune,” Miss Drayton continued, “what with its jaunty melody, but then again, so are we human beings, are we not? We wear bright smiles and trill that all is well even as our hearts are aching. But what else can we do? The world is so full of disappointments, and our lives are so burdened by hardship and sorrow, that if we cried over every sadness, we’d be dripping tears like rain clouds.
” She nodded then, as if in agreement with herself.
“Snatch what happiness you can. That is my advice, Mrs. Munro. Before it is too late. For we shall soon—every last one of us—be asleep beneath the willows.”
Miss Drayton returned her gaze to her dogwood and Mary’s smile curdled. She sagged back against her chair, wishing desperately for a belt of brandy.
Mr. Duffery returned with a plate of pale sugar cookies and offered them first to Miss Drayton, then to Mary, then he placed the plate on the table and sat down.
“There are molasses cookies, too, but they appear to be overly spiced,” he said to Mary in a low voice, so as not to offend Miss Drayton. “An abundance of ginger late in the day is unwise, Mrs. Munro. It over stimulates the digestion and makes for a sleepless night.”
Mary bit into her cookie. It was as dry as sand.
As she washed the bite down with a swallow of lemonade, she suddenly found herself deeply, achingly hungry.
But not for cookies. For the kitchen table in Michael’s flat and the people gathered around it.
She pictured them in her mind’s eye—Fiona and Michael arguing about warehouses, Nell splattering applesauce on Nick’s spotless shirt, Ian and Seamie telling silly jokes, Alec reading his paper, everyone crammed too close together, talking too much, laughing too loudly.
They were there in Michael’s kitchen right now, together, while she sat here, feeling as if she’d been marooned on a dull and humorless desert island.
Guess the dreamboat turned into a shipwreck , the voice said.
Mary started to scold it again, but was suddenly overwhelmed by a longing so fierce that instead she leaned forward, ready to stand up, make some quick, fumbling excuse, and hurry home .
But before she could, Miss Drayton spoke, eyeing the serving table. “We appear to be out of lemonade.”
Her voice, as creaky as the hinges on a coffin, doused the sense of urgency that had come over Mary.
What am I thinking ? she wondered. Rushing off would be unspeakably rude.
And how would she explain her sudden appearance in Michael’s flat?
They would all know that she hadn’t enjoyed her evening with Mr. Duffery.
Michael would know. She would look pathetic, like a woman without a scrap of pride.
“I’ll fetch more lemonade,” she said, starting to rise.
“No, thank you, my dear. I shall ask the maid to do it,” Miss Drayton replied, waving away Mary’s offer.
“It will do me good to stand up and move about.” She rose with Mr. Duffery’s assistance.
“Old bones, Mr. Duffery, old bones,” she sighed, before tottering off toward a young woman in a black dress and white pinafore who had just emerged from the house with a bowl of fruit salad.
“Poor woman,” Mr. Duffery said, as he watched her go.
Then he turned to Mary. “I have discovered, by experimenting on myself, that a nightly regimen of alternating mustard plasters with menthol and camphor wraps to be highly effective in alleviating joint discomfort. I have developed a washable, reusable double-layer cotton dressing, applied to a vulcanized rubber backing and secured with elasticized band, and am pursuing a patent. I shall show you the prototype the next time I pay you a visit. Would you like that?”
I guess that explains the menthol smell. And the mustard. Camphor, too? Why, the man’s a walking mothball.
“I’d love to see the prototype, Mr. Duffery,” Mary said, silencing the voice again .
“Very well,” Mr. Duffery said brightly. “I shall make a plan for next week. But it’s getting late—it’s past seven already.
I should get you home.” He picked up his jacket from the back of his chair and started to shrug it on, but as he did, something fell out of it.
“How careless of me. I should’ve known that would happen,” he said, bending down to retrieve it.
Mary’s eyes widened as she saw what it was. A small box. From Tiffany’s.
Mr. Duffery, smiling, opened the box and held it out to her. A diamond ring sat nestled in a bed of velvet. The color drained from Mary’s face. Her heart knocked against her ribs. No ! she thought frantically. He can’t be…not now … not here …
“It’s my sister’s ring,” Milton Duffery said. “Do you remember me telling you that the stone fell out of it into a bowl of bread dough, and that I cracked my tooth biting into it?”
A giddy relief flooded through Mary. “Oh, yes! Yes, of course I remember!” she exclaimed, pressing her hand to her chest. “It’s your sister’s ring! Your sister’s. ”
If Mr. Duffery noticed that Mary was talking a little too fast and a little too loudly, he gave no sign.
“I had it repaired and picked it up yesterday,” he continued.
“They did a good job, don’t you think? I put the box in my pocket and promptly forgot about it.
So foolish of me. I could have lost it anywhere. ”
“Very foolish, Mr. Duffery,” said Mary. “Do put it back.”
Mr. Duffery snapped the box shut and returned it to his pocket. Then he and Mary said their good-byes to the Temperance Society members and set off to find a cab to take them across town.
Mr. Duffery chattered as they walked, regaling Mary with the many fascinating steps involved in the production of his patented seamless men’s socks, and Mary listened, smiling and nodding—but heard nothing.
She turned her head toward him every now and again, but she didn’t see him.
She rested her hand on his arm, but didn’t feel him.
She saw another man, tall and broad-shouldered, with hair as dark as night and eyes of the deepest blue.
It was his voice she longed to hear, his touch she dreamed of.
Aye, and dreams are all you’ll ever have, Mary Munro , she said to herself.
Michael had no room for her in his heart; it was still too full of grief for his lost wife.
Molly was gone forever, but it was as if she had never left.
And yet, sometimes Mary caught Michael looking at her with a certain softness in his eyes, and dared to hope that he cared for her, too.
If only there was some way she could tell him that Molly didn’t need to go, for she, Mary, was not afraid of ghosts.
But she would not risk baring her feelings only to be told that he did not return them.
Her heart had been broken once, when her beloved husband had died in an accident at the freight yards.
She had fit the pieces back together as best she could, and had risen above her grief for Ian’s sake, but the cracks remained and she would rather love Michael quietly from afar, with her heart whole, cherishing what might have been, than to have it shattered again.
“Ah! Here comes a cab,” Milton Duffery said, pulling Mary out of her reverie. He hurried into the street to flag it down, leaving her on the sidewalk .
As she watched him go, she remembered the trepidation she’d felt earlier when she thought he was offering her a ring. One day, he actually might. What would she do if he did?
Snatch what happiness you can, that is my advice, Mrs. Munro. Before it is too late…
A leftover happiness, small and second best—that’s what Miss Drayton wanted for her. Should she accept it? What else could she hope for? Fairytale endings, those glittering, impossible happily-ever-afters, were for queens and princesses, not for a widow with a son to raise.
“I have engaged the driver! Come, Mrs. Munro!” Milton Duffery shouted from the street, holding the cab’s door open.
Mr. Duffery was not the love of Mary Munro’s life and never would be, but he did have some admirable qualities.
He was courteous, sociable, and solvent, and that was more than she could say for many men.
And he was here, wasn’t he? Taking her out.
Fetching her cookies and now a cab. As she walked toward him, she realized something else—her fragile heart would always be safe with him, for she would never love him enough for him to break it.
Perhaps Miss Drayton was right. Perhaps it was time to be sensible.
To settle.
For a perfectly nice, deathly dull, mildly mustardy man .