“Today’s edition? Yesterdays? Or last week’s?”
“You cannot possibly purport to remember all of that.”
He shrugged.
“Bring me today’s paper,” Elizabeth ordered one of the servants, wishing to call him out on his chicanery for all the eyes at the table to witness. Thumbing through the paper, she said, “Tell me about the main story at the top of column three on page two.”
Zachary stared above at the twelve-foot square stained-glass skylight that restrained the heavens while paging through the paper in his mind. “Congress first session. Regular report of proceedings, Belknap’s impeachment begun—he pleads that he is a private citizen and hence cannot be impeached, Kilbourn’s case in the House–pinch backs salary. Do you wish me to go on?
He waited while she scanned the paper. “Extraordinary. Everything you quoted is as it is written.”
“And for his next con, he’ll tell us our futures,” Dyer sniggered, and like a chorus of hyenas everyone laughed at his patronizing joke.
Without hesitation, Zachary said to Elizabeth, “I remember everything—in detail.” He liked the fifty shades of pink that rushed to her face.
Elizabeth slapped the paper down on the table. “I would hope a man’s word is his honor?”
She was referring to his promise. “A man without nobility to his word has no character.”
Dyer coughed. “The ideals of the unfortunate.”
“Chen, my friend, once told me,” Zachary began, refusing to be diminished by Dyer, “‘Lie to a liar for that is his coin, steal from the thief for that is effortless, lay a trap for the trickster for that is easy, too, but beware of the honest man.”’
Elizabeth dropped her linen napkin on the floor. He bent his head to retrieve the item at the same time she did. Beneath the shelter of the table, their hands touched. His closed over hers. Soft. Trembling. She pulled back, staring up at him with storm cloud eyes that threatened rain and whispered, “You won’t?—”
His heart thumped hard in his chest. Her daughter was at risk. He’d keep her secret. “To my grave.”
Satisfied with his response, she straightened with a sudden buoyancy. Her happiness gave him surprise. He liked it. He liked it a lot.
She thumbed through the paper, and with a sly expression said, “I’ll bet you two opera tickets in the Spencer box that you can’t tell me what is on page seven halfway down the third column.”
Her mother dropped her fork on her plate where it clanged. “Elizabeth!”
Elizabeth panned a horrified expression, dabbing her lips with her napkin. “Oh, dear. I’ve broken the cult of domesticity by gambling.”
“Let her have her day,” Dyer said, supporting her.
All eyes around the table waited expectantly, most relishing Zachary’s coming failure. Too bad to disappoint. Like a conjurer doing a trick, he stared over a large sideboard where Frederic Church’s painting ofNear Damascushung.He paged through the paper in his mind, stopping on page seven, third column, halfway down.
“The markets. Total receipts of produce per the North River, vessels, and railroads. Ashes twenty-five. Beeswax, twenty-five. Cotton bales, three thousand five hundred and five, copper barrels, thirty-two, flour, sixteen thousand two hundred and eighty-three barrels, barley, one thousand nine hundred and sixty bushels. I don’t want to bore anyone. The rest of the page is dedicated to the money market, livestock market, New York state domestic markets, notices to bondholders, the annual meeting of stockholders of the Missouri, Kansas, and Texas railway, and other miscellaneous banking and housing announcements. Satisfied?”
She sat back in awe of him. “Extraordinary. Everything you quoted is as it is written.”
He’d presented a coup de gras and earned her laughter. How he liked the sound of summer rain and birdsong, too.
“I can’t find any fault with you, Mr. Rourke.”
“A cheap parlor trick by a cowboy.” Alva flicked her eyes over her inferior.
Elizabeth leaned over and whispered to him again, her scent entwining him. Lavender. “Mother wears her propriety like thorns. Aloofness comes easy as she mastered it years ago.”
“Your two brothers fought for the South?” harangued Dyer, not to be forgotten.
The older man sought to denigrate Zachary’s family as participants on the other side of the war. “Yes, sir. General John Daniel Rourke and Colonel Ryan Rourke. My brother, ColonelLucas Rourke, fought for the North and was a good friend of the late President Lincoln.” Zachary could drop names, too.
“And you?” Dyer probed.
Zach idled his fork, and then scrutinized Dyer. “My family knew my opinion on the war. I wanted nothing to do with it, so I headed west.”
