The Firebrand

Fine, thought Lucy. They all expected her to disgrace herself. She could manage that with very little effort. She swept the room with her gaze, noting the presence of several prominent guests—Mr. Cyrus McCormick and Mr. George Pullman, whose enterprises had made them nearly as wealthy as Lucy’s own father, Colonel Hathaway, hero of the War Between the States. She spied Mr. Robert Todd Lincoln, son of the late great Emancipator and one of the leading social lights of the city. Jasper Lamott, head of the Brethren of Orderly Righteousness, sat in smug superiority. Watching them, she felt an ugly little stab of envy. How simple it was for men to stand around discussing great matters, secure in the knowledge that the world was theirs for the taking.

“I believe,” she said, “that women have as much right as men to hold office in the church or the government. In fact, I intend to support Mrs. Victoria Woodhull’s campaign for president of the United States,” she concluded grandly.

Higgins’s brow descended with disapproval. “That woman is a menace to decent people everywhere.”

Lucy felt a surge of outrage, but the heated emotion mingled strangely with something unexpected—the tingling excitement touched off by his nearness. “Most unenlightened men think so.”

“Her ideas about free love are disgusting,” Jasper Lamott called across the room, instigating rumbles of assent from the listeners.

“You only think that because you don’t understand her,” Lucy stated.

“I understand that free love means immorality and promiscuity,” Higgins said.

“It most certainly does not.” She spoke with conviction, trying to do honor to the great woman’s ideas, even though she knew her mother would be calling for smelling salts if she heard Lucy debating promiscuity with a strange man in front of a crowd of avid listeners.

“Isn’t that exactly what she means?” Randolph Higgins asked. “That a woman should be allowed to follow her basest instincts, even abandoning her husband and family if she wishes it?”

“Not in the least.” In the audience, heads swung back and forth as if they were watching a tennis match. “The true meaning of free love is the pursuit of happiness. For men and women both.”

“A woman’s happiness is found in marriage and family,” he stated. “Every tradition we have bears this out.”

“Where in heaven’s name do we get this tradition of pretending a marriage is happy when one of the parties is miserable? Marriage is a matter of the heart, Mr. Higgins, not the law. When a marriage is over spiritually, then it should be over in fact.”

“You’re almost as much of a menace as she is,” he said with a harsh laugh. “Next you’ll be telling me you approve of divorce.”

“And you’ll be telling me you believe a fourteen-year-old girl forced to wed an alcoholic should stay with him all her life.” That was precisely what had befallen Victoria Woodhull. But rather than being beaten down by circumstances, she’d begun a crusade to free women from the tyranny and degradation of men.

“People must learn to live with the choices they’ve made,” he said. “Or is it your conviction that a woman need not take responsibility for her own decisions?”

“Like many women, Mrs. Woodhull wasn’t allowed to decide. And sir, you know nothing about me nor my convictions.”

“You’re a spoiled, overprivileged debutante who deals with boredom by stirring up trouble,” he stated. “If you really cared about the plight of women, you’d be over in the West Division, feeding the hungry.”

A smattering of applause came from some of the men.

“Women would be better served if men would simply concede their right to vote.”

“You should relocate to the Wyoming Territory. They allow women to vote there.”

“Then they don’t need me there,” Lucy insisted. “They have already won.”

“Such passion,” he said.

“Whether you’ll admit it or not, the entire universe revolves around feelings of passion.”

“My dear Miss Hathaway,” Mr. Higgins said reasonably, “that is exactly why we have the institution you revile—marriage.”

A curious feeling came over Lucy as she sparred with him. She expected to feel offended by his challenges, but instead, she was intrigued. When she looked into his eyes, a shivery warmth came over her. She kept catching herself staring at his mouth, too, and thinking about the way it had felt when he had whispered in her ear. The feeling was quite…sexual in nature.

“The institution of marriage has been the cornerstone of mankind since time was counted,” he said. “It will take more than an unhappy crackpot female to convince the world otherwise.”

“The only crackpot here is—”

“I beg your pardon.” Like a storm of rose petals, Phoebe Palmer entered the salon, her face a mask of polite deference. The finishing school’s self-appointed doyenne of decency always managed to reel Lucy in when she teetered on the verge of disgrace. “Miss Lucy is needed and it’s ever so urgent. Come along, dear, there we are.” For a woman of the daintiest appearance, Phoebe had a grip of steel as she took Lucy by the arm. Without making a scene, Lucy had no choice but to follow.

“There is a name for the institution you advocate, Mr. Higgins,” she said, firing a parting shot over her shoulder. “Fortunately, slavery was rendered illegal eight years ago by the Emancipation Proclamation.”

Phoebe gave a final tug on her arm and pulled her through the doorway. “I declare,” she said, scolding even before they left the room, “I can’t leave you alone for a moment. I thought a Christian lecture would be safe enough, but I see that I was wrong.”

“You should have heard what they were saying,” Lucy said. “They said we were the gate of the devil.”

“Who?”

“Women, that’s who. You would have spoken up, too.”

Phoebe’s mouth twitched, resisting a smile. “Ah, Lucy. You’re always shooting your mouth off and getting in trouble. And I am constantly trying to stop you from committing social suicide.”

“I think I did that already, last August when I burned my corset at that suffrage rally.” Lucy extracted her arm from Phoebe’s grip. “Speaking of trouble, how is Kathleen getting along?”

“That’s why I came to get you.” Phoebe gestured toward the French doors, draped by fringed velvet curtains. “She is flirting outrageously with Dylan Kennedy.”

Lucy followed her gesture and spied Kathleen O’Leary in an emerald gown, her head of blazing red hair bright against the backdrop of Mr. Dylan Kennedy’s dark suit. Watching them, she felt a keen sense of satisfaction. Kathleen was much more than a lady’s maid. She was their friend. And tonight, she was their pet project.

Their prank was a social experiment, actually. Lucy claimed it was possible to take an Irish maid, dress her up in finery, and no one would ever guess at her humble background. Phoebe, an unrepentant snob, swore that people of quality would see right through the disguise.

Framed by the French doors, Kathleen tilted her head and smiled at Mr. Kennedy, one of the most eligible bachelors in Chicago. The night sky in the background seemed to glow and pulse with the city lights. As she watched, Lucy felt a tug of wistfulness. They were both so attractive and romantic, so luminous with the sparkling energy that surrounded them. She could not imagine what it would be like to have a man admire her that way.

“Well,” she said briskly to Phoebe. “One thing is clear. I have won the wager. You must donate a hundred dollars to the Women’s Suffrage Movement.”

“There’s still time for Kathleen to stick her foot in her mouth.” Phoebe sent Lucy a wry smile. “However, tonight that seems to be your specialty.”

Lucy laughed. “Only tonight?”

“I was trying to be polite.” She linked arms with Lucy again. “I wish Deborah had come with us this evening.”

A frisson of anxiety chased away Lucy’s good humor. “She seemed quite ill when we left Miss Boylan’s.”

“I’m sure she will be fi—Good heavens, it’s Lord de Vere.” Without a backward glance, Phoebe sailed off to greet the weak-chinned English nobleman, whom she hoped and prayed she might marry one day.

Lucy caught herself thinking about Mr. Higgins, and the way their public disagreement had led to private thoughts. It was a rare thing, to meet a man who made her think. She should not have antagonized him so, but she couldn’t help herself. He was provocative, and she was easily provoked.

As more people filed out of the lecture salon, she spotted him moving toward the adjoining room, and felt herself edging toward an admission. An admission, followed by a plan of action, for that was Lucy’s way. She saw no point in believing in something without acting on that belief.

What she admitted to herself, what she had come to believe, was that she was wildly attracted to Mr. Randolph Higgins. Until tonight, she’d never met a man who made her feel the lightning sting of attraction. It had to mean something. It had to mean that he was the one.

That was where her plan of action came in. She wanted him for her lover.

When he went over to a long table, laden with punch and hors d’oeuvres, she marched straight across the room to him. He gave no sign that he’d seen her, but when he turned away from the table, he held two cups of lemonade.

“You,” he said, handing her a cup, “are the most annoying creature I have ever met.”

“Really?” She took a sip of the sweet-tart lemonade. “I take that as a compliment.”

“So you are both annoying and slow-witted,” he said.

“You don’t really think that.” Watching him over the rim of her cup, she added. “I am complimented because I have made you think.”

Lord, but he was a fine specimen of a man. She felt such a surge of triumph that she could not govern the wide grin on her face. She’d found him at last. After a lifetime of believing she would never meet someone who could arouse her passion, share her dreams, bring her joy, she’d finally found him. A man she could admire, perhaps even love.

“Do I amuse you?” he asked, frowning good-naturedly.

“Why would you think that?”

“Because you keep smiling at me even though I have just called you annoying and—”

“Slow-witted,” she reminded him.

“Yes,” he said. “Rude of me.”

“It was. But I forgive you.” She glanced furtively from side to side. “Mr. Higgins, do you suppose we could go somewhere…a little less public?” Before he could answer, she took his hand and pulled him toward the now-empty lecture room. The dry windstorm that had been swirling through the city all evening battered at the windows. Gaslight sconces glowed on the walls, and orange light flickered mysteriously in the windowpanes. Rows of gilded chairs flanked a central aisle, and just for a moment, as she led him along the crimson carpet runner toward the front of the room, she had the fanciful notion that this was a wedding.

“Miss Hathaway, what is this about?” he asked, taking his hand from hers.

“I wanted to speak to you in private.” Her heart raced. This was a simple matter, she told herself. Men and women arranged trysts all the time. She should not get overwrought about it.

“Very well.” He propped his hip on the back of a chair, the pose so negligently masculine and evocative that she nearly forgot her purpose. “I’m listening.”

“Did you enjoy the lecture tonight, Mr. Higgins?”

“Honestly?”

“Honestly.”

“It was a crashing bore.”

Clearly he didn’t share her passion for debate. She pulled in a deep breath. “I see. Well, then—”

“—until a certain young lady began to speak her mind,” he added. “Then I found it truly interesting.”

“Interesting?”

“Yes.”

“And…provocative?”

“Most definitely.”

“Did you think it was…stimulating?”

He laughed aloud. “Now that you mention it.”

Her spirits soared. “Oh, I am glad, Mr. Higgins. So glad indeed. May I call you Randolph?”

“Actually my friends call me Rand.”

She most definitely wanted to be his friend. “Very well, Rand. And you must call me Lucy.”

“This is a very odd conversation, Lucy.”

“I agree. And I haven’t even made my point yet.”

“Perhaps you should do so, then.”

“Make my point.”

“Yes.”

Ye gods, she was afraid. But she wanted him so much. “Well, it’s like this, Mr.—Rand. Earlier when I spoke of passionate feelings, I was referring to you.”

His face went dead white. His mouth moved, but no sound came out.

“You see,” she rushed on, “I’ve always wanted to have a lover. I never did encounter a man I wanted to spend my life with, and if I took a lover I would simply have no need of a husband.”

“Lucky you.” Some of the color, and arrogance, returned to his handsome face.

She could sense suppressed laughter beneath his wry comment. “But I wouldn’t want a love affair just for the sake of having one. I’ve been waiting to meet a man I felt attracted to.” She looked him square in the eye. “And I’ve found you at last.”

The humor left his expression. “Lucy.” The low timbre of his voice passed over her like a caress.

“Yes?”

“Lucy, my dear, you are a most attractive girl.”

She clasped her hands, thoroughly enchanted. “Do you think so?”

“Indeed I do.”

“That is wonderful. No one has ever thought me attractive before.” She was babbling, but couldn’t help herself. “My mother says I am too intense, and far too outspoken, and that I—”

“Lucy.” He grasped her upper arms.

She nearly melted, but held herself upright, awaiting his kiss. She’d never been kissed by a man before. When she was younger, Cornelius Cotton had kissed her, but she later found out his older brother had paid him to do it, so that didn’t count. This was going to be different. Her first honest-to-goodness kiss from the handsomest man ever created.

Late at night, she and the other young ladies of Miss Boylan’s would stay up after lights-out, whispering of what it was like to kiss a man, and of the ways a man might touch a woman. One thing she remembered was to close her eyes. It seemed a shame to close them when he was so wonderful to look at, but she wanted to do this right. She shut her eyes.

“Lucy,” he said again, an edge of desperation in his voice. “Lucy, look at me.”

She readily opened her eyes. What a glorious face he had, so alive with character and robust health and touching sincerity. So filled with sensual promise, the way his lips curved into a smile, the way his eyes were brimming with…pity? Could that be pity she saw in his eyes? Surely not.

“Rand—”

“Hush.” Ever so gently, he touched a finger to her lips to silence her.

She burned from his caress, but he quickly took his finger away.

“Lucy,” he said, “before you say anymore, there’s something I must tell you—”

“Randolph!” a voice called from the doorway. “There you are, Randolph. I’ve been looking all over for you.”

Lucy turned to the back of the salon. There, in the doorway, stood the most stunning woman she’d ever seen. Petite, blond and willowy, she held her lithe body in the shape of a question mark, clad in a beautiful gown bearing the trademark rosettes of Worth’s Salon de Lumière. In a rustle of perfumed silk, she moved toward them, hand outstretched toward Rand.

“I’ve found you at last,” the gorgeous blond woman said, her words an ironic echo of Lucy’s.

Rand’s pallor quickly changed to dull red as he bowed over her hand. “Miss Lucy Hathaway,” he said, straightening up and stepping out of the way, “I’d like you to meet Diana Higgins.” He slipped an arm around her slender waist. “My wife.”

Chapter Two

For a few seconds, only the wailing of the night wind filled the silent void. Something, some bizarre state of nerves in those endless seconds, gave Rand a heightened sensitivity. The pads of his fingers, resting at the small of his wife’s back, detected the smooth, taut silk over the armored shell of her corset. From a corner of his eye, he saw Diana’s expression change from mild curiosity to keen nosiness. And although she probably did not mean to be audible, he heard Miss Lucy Hathaway breathe the words, “Oh. My.”

Just that, coupled with an expression probably shared by Joan of Arc at the moment of her martyrdom. She looked as though she was about to vomit.

Foolish baggage, he thought. This was no less than she deserved for making outrageous proposals to strange men.

“How do you do, Miss Hathaway?” Diana said, unfailingly polite as she always was in social situations.

“Very well, thank you, Mrs. Higgins. It’s a distinct pleasure to make your acquaintance.” Lucy didn’t shrink from Diana’s probing gaze.

Despite his opinion of the radical young woman’s views, Rand could not deny his interest. She was not only the most annoying creature he’d ever met, she was also the most compelling. Dark-haired and dark-eyed, she had a heart-shaped face. Her pointed chin, high brow and wide eyes gave her an expression of perpetual wonder. The passion and sensual awareness she’d spoken of so boldly seemed to reside in the depths of those velvety dark eyes, and in the fullness of her lips.

Yet as quickly as she’d shocked him with her outrageous proposal, she seemed to come to heel like a spaniel trained to obedience when thrust into a social situation. She dutifully exchanged pleasantries with Diana, who described their recent move from Philadelphia, and chatted about the unseasonable heat that plagued the city, robbing Chicago of the clear, chill days of autumn.

“Well, I must thank you for keeping my husband entertained,” Diana remarked. “He was quite certain this would be a hopelessly dreary evening.”

Rand shifted beneath a mixed burden of guilt and irritation. During the argument they’d had prior to his coming to the evening’s event, he’d claimed she’d be bored by a bombastic evangelical reading, and that the only reason he was attending was to make the acquaintance of the prominent businessmen of Chicago.

The irony was, he’d really meant it.

Lucy Hathaway clasped her hands demurely in front of her. “I’m afraid I’ve failed, then,” she said. “Your husband doesn’t find me at all entertaining. Quite the contrary. I fear I’ve offended him with my…political opinions.”

“You’re not offensive, Miss Hathaway,” Rand said smoothly. “Merely wrong.”

“Isn’t he charming?” Diana laughed. Only Rand, who knew her well, heard the contempt in her voice.

Miss Hathaway moved toward the door. “I really must be going. I don’t like the look of the weather tonight.” She curtsied in that curious trained-spaniel manner. “It was a pleasure to meet you both, and to welcome you to Chicago. I hope you’ll be very happy here.” In a swish of skirts and wounded dignity, she walked out of the salon.

“What an odd bird,” Diana remarked in an undertone.

What a strangely charming bundle of contradictions, Rand thought. He was intrigued by women like Lucy. But he was also discomfited by a surprising and unwelcome lust for her. He’d engaged her in what he thought was a harmless flirtation, nothing more, but she had taken him seriously.

“How on earth did you get stuck with her?” asked his wife.

He’d seen her sitting alone at the back of the salon, and pure impulse had compelled him to sit down beside her. He thought about the way Lucy had taken his hand later, captured his gaze with her own and confessed her attraction to him. But to his wife, he said, “I have no idea.”

“Anyway, you did well,” Diana declared. “It’s important to impress the right people, and the Hathaways are undoubtedly the right people.”

“What are you doing here? Is Christine all right?” he asked.

“The child is fine,” Diana said. “And I came because I am the one who is sick, not our daughter. I am positively ill with boredom, Randolph. All I’ve done all day long is sit by the window watching the boats on the river and the traffic going over the bridge to the North Division. I’m so tired of living like a gypsy in a hotel. Shouldn’t you have started work on the house by now?”

“You’re sure Christine’s fine,” he said, ignoring her diatribe. Their fifteen-month-old daughter was the bright and shining center of his life. Earlier in the evening she’d been fretful, a little feverish, and he’d convinced Diana to stay at Sterling House rather than leave Christine with the nurse.

“The baby was fast asleep when I left,” Diana said. “Becky Damson was in the parlor, knitting. I thought you’d be delighted to see me, and here you are, flirting away with the most famous heiress in Chicago.”

“Who? Lucy?”

“And on a first-name basis, no less. The Hathaways are an Old Settler family. Her father is a war hero, and her grandfather made a fortune in grain futures. If you hope to be a successful banker, you’re supposed to know these things.”

“Ah, but I have you to keep track of them for me.”

“Apparently I need someone to keep track of you,” she observed.

Already regretting the brief flirtation, he vowed to devote more attention to his increasingly unhappy wife. No matter what he did, it wasn’t enough. She’d been dissatisfied with their life back in Philadelphia, so he’d moved her and their baby daughter to Chicago.

He was trying to launch a career in banking while Diana frantically shopped and planned for the grand house they intended to build on the fashionable north shore. But even the prospect of a palatial new residence failed to keep her discontent at bay.

“Come and meet Mr. Lamott,” Rand suggested, knowing she would be impressed, and that Jasper Lamott—like every other man—would find his wife enchanting.

As he escorted her into the reception salon, Rand fought down a feeling of disappointment. When he and Diana had married, he’d been full of idealistic visions of what their life together would be like. He had pictured a comfortable home, a large, happy family putting down roots in the fertile ground of convention. They were things he used to dream about when he was very young, things he’d never had for himself. But as the early years of their marriage slipped by, Diana paid little attention to roots or family. She seemed more interested in shopping and travel than in devoting herself to her husband and child.

He kept hoping the move to Chicago would improve matters, but with each passing day, he was coming to understand that a change of venue was not the solution to a problem that stemmed from the complicated inner geography of his heart.

He caught himself brooding about Lucy Hathaway’s bold contention that women were stifled by the unfair demands foisted upon them by men who shackled them with the duties of a wife and mother.

“Do you feel stifled?” he asked Diana.

She frowned, her pale, lovely face uncomprehending. “What on earth are you talking about, Randolph?”

“By Christine and me. Do you feel stifled, or shackled?”

She frowned more deeply. “What a very odd question.”

“Do you?”

She took a step back. “I have no idea, Randolph.” Then she fixed a bright, beautiful, artificial smile on her face and walked into the reception room.

Rand couldn’t help himself. He kept trying to catch a glimpse of Lucy Hathaway, but apparently she and her friends had already left the hotel. For the past forty minutes, he’d wanted to do the same, anxious to get back to Sterling House and his daughter. She would be asleep by now, but that didn’t matter. He loved to watch Christine sleep. The sight of her downy blond curls upon a tiny pillow, her chubby hands opened like stars against the quilt, always filled him with a piercing tenderness and a sense that all was right with the world.

Diana had never been quite so well-entertained by their daughter, although she was proud of Christine’s beauty and loved the admiring comments people made when they saw the baby. At the moment she was gossiping happily with the mayor’s nieces and showed no sign of wanting to leave.

Restless, Rand went to the tall windows that framed a view of the city. Gaslight created blurry stars along the straight arteries of the main thoroughfares and the numerous tall buildings of the business district gathered around the impressive cupola of the massive courthouse.