Page 23 of A New World for the Irish Daughter

“Oh, that.” He sighed, shaking his head. “I know it’s not forever, and it’s not particularly respectable, but… it’s something, at least, and maybe I can do some good there.” He paused, as if he wanted to say something more, but then he shook his head, his expression darkening. “You should have asked me to help you, Maggie.”

She shook her head, firm now. “It’s better this way, Brendan,” she insisted. “But it doesn’t mean… it doesn’t mean I don’t care for you.”

He tensed and then took a step toward her. “Doyou care for me? Now?”

Maggie tried to swallow past the ache in her throat. “I do care for you,” she confessed in a whisper. “More, in fact, than I’ve… I’ve ever been willing to admit to you, or even to myself.” She tried to smile, but her lips trembled and she pressed them together. “I ran from it for a long time because I was afraid,” she confessed, “and because I thought I wanted things that ended up leaving me emptier than ever.” She shook her head. “But none of that matters now, because… because it feels like we’ve already missed each other. It’s too late, Brendan.”

“Maggie—” He reached for her arm, and she took a step away, not wanting to prolong either of their pain.

“The nursing program is for two years,” she explained hurriedly, remembering what Dr. Brown had told her the previous afternoon. “And student nurses can’t marry or even court during all that time. And afterward, nurses aren’t meant to marry. If I married, I’d most likely have to leave the profession, and I’ve finally found something that gives me purpose, that means I’m helping someone in this world. Who knows if I’m suited to it, but I need to try.”

He looked set to argue, and she rushed to continue, stumbling over the words.

“And I really do believe it’s better this way, between us. We’ve missed each other too many times, wanted different things, even if it didn’t always seem that way. Let’s not keep trying and hurting each other in the process. I’m sorry—truly sorry—but…” She swallowed hard. “Don’t you think I’m right?”

He stared at her for a long moment as the weight of the years lay heavily between them. In that moment, Maggie remembered so much and all of it made her ache—the first time she’d met him, sweeping the steps of his grocery back in New York. The sleigh ride through Central Park, when he’d held her hand and she’d felt herself come alive, but even then she’d fought it. When he’d told her he loved her, and she’d insisted he wanted a wife, not a woman with plans and ambition, such as she was. When, in Chicago, he’d told her she was only his friend, and that it had felt like a relief. Every time they’d come together, they’d butt heads, broken hearts. It seemed as if it couldn’t be any other way between them.

“Brendan…” she whispered, and finally he nodded slowly.

“Yes, you’re right,” he agreed quietly. “It is better this way, Maggie.”

Maggie clutched her handbag to her, the twenty-one dollars still crumpled in her fist. “I’m sorry,” she said again, becauseshewas, deeply, achingly sorry, but she knew even that emotion wasn’t enough, and she suspected Brendan knew it too.

He didn’t reply, and after another endless moment, she turned away, hurrying off, without letting herself look back.

At the parlor house, Maggie gave Miss Jessie her rent money for the three weeks, placing each crumpled bill on the desk with decision. Miss Jessie watched, her eyes narrowed, her lips pressed together.

“I’ll be leaving in three weeks,” Maggie told her. “I’ve applied to the nurses’ training school at the Children’s Hospital, and it comes with room and board.”

“Have you now?” Miss Jessie replied tonelessly. She didn’t take the bills Maggie had laid on her desk.

“I want to thank you, for your kindness,” Maggie continued, meeting the other woman’s gaze with a level one of her own. “I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye, and I’m too outspoken for my own good—I’ve been so before, certainly, and it has gotten me into trouble more than once.” She managed a smile that she was heartened to see Miss Jessie return, if only faintly. “But Ilikeyou, Jessamine,” she told her honestly, “and I think you do these girls a lot of good, all things considered. It isn’t an easy life, heaven knows, but you make it a little easier for them. I just wish…” She sighed as she shook her head, remembering that morning, as she’d come into Jenny’s bedroom, saw how pale the girl looked, after her evening’s entertaining.

“Don’t scold me,” Jenny had told her wearily, her eyes still closed. “I know you disapprove, but Mr. Grayson was askin’ for me special, and I couldn’t say no. Not to him. He’s the best chance I got.”

“Mr. Grayson?” Maggie had asked, sitting on the edge of Jenny’s bed. “Is he… yourparticularfriend?”

Jenny had opened her eyes as she’d given Maggie an impish grin. “He is, and he was ever so kind last night, Miss Maggie. He didn’t ask me to do anythin’, you know, down below.”

Maggie had swallowed hard, not wanting to tarnish the young girl’s perception of the man. “I see,” she’d said instead. “Jenny… I wanted to tell you, after visiting Dr. Brown at her hospital, she wished me to ask you if you’d like a position at her home?”

Jenny had wrinkled her nose, seeming nonplussed by the news. “A position?” she’d repeated. “What kind of position?”

“As a maid,” Maggie had told her, injecting an enthusiasm in her voice she hoped Jenny might feel, as well. “In a very nice house. You’d have room and board and be paid six dollars a week, and Dr. Brown is so very kind?—”

“Amaid!” Jenny had not sounded at all impressed by such an offer. “And only six dollars aweek? Miss Maggie, I make as much as that here, on a good night!”

“Yes, but Jenny…” Maggie had stared at her in confused appeal. “Wouldn’t you… wouldn’t you rather be a maid?”

“No thanks,” Jenny replied with decision. “I’d been workin’ as a maid for my pa since I was six. I came to the city to get away from that life. I ain’t goin’ back to it, and not for six dollars a week!” She’d laughed then, before rolling over and going back to sleep, while Maggie had stared at her in dismay. She had not, she’d realized, anticipated such a response.

“I suppose,” Maggie told Miss Jessie now, “that I wish things could be different for girls like Jenny, and for women everywhere, but I know they’re not, and we have to live in this world, not the one we dream of.” Jenny had made her choice, and she would make hers. She smiled again, firmly this time. “I hope we can part on good terms, when the time comes.”

With her head bent, Miss Jessie stared down at the crumpled bills without speaking, and Maggie had no idea how she hadreceived her peace offering. She’d meant what she’d said; shedidlike Jessamine Conant, even if she didn’t always like what she did or how she did it. Miss Jessie had been kind to her when she’d desperately needed kindness, and for that she would always be grateful.

Finally, Miss Jessie looked up, her eyes bright with, Maggie realized with a ripple of shock, what looked like unshed tears. She’d never seen the madam so moved before.

“Thank you for your words,” Miss Jessie stated formally. She cleared her throat before continuing, “Indeed, I hope we part on good terms, Maggie.” She nodded once, a dismissal, and with an answering smile and nod, Maggie left, the wrinkled bills still lying untouched on the desk.