Page 38 of A New World for the Irish Daughter

“I thought you were happy?—”

He let out a disbelieving snort. “Happy? No.” He fell silent for a moment, his head bowed. “Content, maybe,” he allowed. “After… after everything that happened with Holmes in Chicago… You know he’s been arrested again?” Maggie nodded; she’d seen the article in the newspaper, and had wondered if Brendan had, too. “They’re going to investigate his building in Chicago,” he continued. “They’re calling it a murder castle now.” His throat worked, and he continued in a low voice, “God onlyknows what they’ll find. How many people—how many innocent young women—he killed in that hellish place, and hid away in the cellar or some cupboard or?—”

Maggie heard the bitter regret in his voice and she ached for him. “Brendan, don’t?—”

He shook his head to keep her from saying anything more, and she fell silent. “Helping out at Jessie’s… oh, I know it wasn’t the same,” he said. “It wasn’t remotely the same. Yet somehow, anytime I showed some chancer the door, or stood up for one of those young girls… it felt like I was making it right, just a little, not enough,neverenough, for what happened in Chicago. But I could live with myself, at least, if only just.”

“Brendan.” Maggie laid a hand on his arm. “You mustn’t blame yourself. The man was a crazed killer?—”

“And some part of me knew it,” he cut her off once more. “Not the whole, not even half, but… I knew something was wrong.” He drove one hand through his hair, his head bowed, his voice still full of bitterness. “Iknewit, and I stayed anyway.” He dropped his hand as he shook off her hand from his arm. “I don’t know if I’ll find what I’m looking for in Alaska. Maybe I’ll never find it, but… I want a fresh start. Ineedone. And Jessie—she understands that. She always knew I wasn’t going to stay a handyman in a brothel forever, God help me.”

“But…” Tears filled Maggie’s eyes and she did her best to blink them back. “I might never see you again.” Did anyoneevercome back from Alaska? It seemed like a vast, endless ocean of land that swallowed people whole. “And Danny and Da,” she continued, her voice catching. “They’re going, too? I might never seeany of youever again?”

Brendan smiled sorrowfully as he gave a little shrug. “I don’t rightly know, Maggie. I’ve never been there before. It’s a long way, but…” He shrugged again, letting that thought trail off intosilence. Into nothing, because Maggie knew he was agreeing with her.

She rose from the sofa, her fists bunched in her skirts as she crossed the room, her body trembling with emotion. “And their minds are made up?” she asked, whirling around to face him. “All of you, your minds are made up to do this thing? To go?”

Brendan nodded slowly. “I reckon so.”

She let out a broken sound, half sigh, half sob. “There’s nothing I can say that would make you reconsider?”

“Maggie…” Brendan reached one hand out toward her before letting it fall to his side. “You have your own life here. Your nursing… your friends…” He trailed off as Maggie simply stared at him.

She had her nursing, but what else? She had no real friends—Wilhemina had been her closest one, and she was moving to Monterey. The other nurses were friendly enough, but Philip was in Berlin and Adelaide was so busy, in an entirely different world from her, with a different social circle, greater aspirations…

What did she really have here? What kind of life?

For a moment, she let herself picture what her life might look like if she was offered a position at the hospital—living in the nurses’ quarters, working ten- or twelve-hour days, only to fall wearily into the bed at the end of every single one, alone. Always alone.

“I like nursing,” she said quietly. “I like knowing I’m making a difference in the world. To help patients, to see their lives improve, is… well, it’s wonderful. But…” She found she couldn’t finish, didn’t want to tell him how lonely she’d been.

She turned to stare out the window; night had fallen, and she went to close the drapes, pulling them across with a rattle of their rings. She remained with her back to Brendan, facing thecurtained window, her head slightly bowed. For a long moment, neither of them spoke.

“May I see them, at least?” she finally asked. “To say goodbye?”

“It would be too dangerous, Maggie, I’m sorry. The gang is looking for them, and they’re out for blood. Danny and your da have already arranged to boardCity of Puebloat dawn tomorrow.”

She turned to face him, hiding her shaking hands in her skirt and trying her hardest to keep her voice steady. “And when does it leave?” she asked. “This ship?”

“Ten o’clock or thereabouts, on the morning tide.”

And they would all be on it. Da, Danny and Brendan. Everyone she knew and loved in the whole world.

Maggie nodded slowly, knowing there was nothing she could do but accept what Brendan was telling her, this twist of fate that that capricious creature had handed to her once again.

God help her,whydid it have to be so hard?

“I’m sorry,” Brendan said again, quietly. He looked as if he was going to say something else, but then he simply shook his head. “I should go,” he said instead. “There’s a lot to do to be ready for the voyage.”

Maggie nodded jerkily, unable to speak past the lump forming in her throat. Too close to tears, she didn’t dare blink.

Brendan stared at her for another long moment. “Maggie…” he began, looking torn, and for a second Maggie thought he would embrace her. He took a step toward her as if he would, and she tensed in expectation, but then he simply shook his head again, seeming both resigned and resolute. “Goodbye,” he said, and he walked out of the room without hugging her or even shaking her hand. Without even looking back.

That was it, then, Maggie thought numbly. The end of everything that had ever been between them, after so manyyears of both friendship and disappointment, of affection and hope.

She remained in the sitting room, staring sightlessly ahead, until Wilhemina and a few of the other nurses rushed in, eager to know who the gentleman caller was and what had happened between them.

“He’s going to Alaska,” Maggie replied lifelessly. “My brother and father, too.”