He strode out of the café, Delia following close behind. “You can’t ever repay what you stole from me. You can’t give me back the starry-eyed innocence you killed when you stole that money.”
“You’re looking for reasons to keep your anger stoked,” he accused. “The gamble worked, and I got our investment back ten times over.”
“It was luck,” she retaliated. “Over a dozen teams were competing for that prize, and you could have lost everything.”
“But Ididn’t,” he pointed out. On a cloudless July morning in 1908, Glenn Curtiss piloted theJune Bugtwice the necessary distance to win theScientific Americanprize. It was a glorious triumph, and Finn’s cut of the prize money was enough to open their kite shop, if Delia hadn’t been so incensed about the money.
He had apologized for taking it. He’d apologized until he was blue in the face, but nothing worked. He was done chasing after her, begging for a crumb of forgiveness. Winning that flying contest was the proudest accomplishment of Finn’s life. He got to be part of a team of dreamers who put that plane together and took a huge leap forward in the world of aviation. Delia never even congratulated him.
Even today, the mere mention of Hammondsport was enoughto awaken all her old jealousies. She didn’t even look at him as she walked away from him.
“I’ll meet you at the train station tomorrow morning to go see Taft,” he shouted at her retreating back. “I’ll have three hundred dollars with me, and if you don’t take it, it’s proof that you’re small, bitter, and petty.”
Finn’s shout echoed in Delia’s ears as she marched away from him. His accusations stung because they were true. Instead of letting him pay her back ten years ago, she took out a loan to attend secretarial school. Each time he contacted her to pay her back, she had refused. Some of it was pride, but mostly it was self-protection.
Shehadwanted to keep her anger stoked. Keeping the debt between them was daily proof of Finn’s reckless nature. No woman who valued stability should hitch her wagon to a man willing to gamble everything on a long shot. Finn’s daredevil nature was partly why she found Wesley so appealing in comparison.
Delia was still wallowing in resentment when she arrived at the train station the following morning.
Finn was waiting on the platform, ready for their trip to Yale University. A gaggle of young ladies, probably on their way to work at the nearby woolen mills, clustered around him. He lapped up their attention and regaled them with tales of his exploits in France.
Delia sent him a dignified nod, which he returned. But she wasn’t about to join his admirers and so took a seat on a wood bench, setting her leather case beside her. It was going to be a long day. It would take almost three hours to get to Yale by train, attend the meeting with President Taft, followed by another three hours for the journey home.
Ten minutes later, a train whistle sounded in the distance, and Delia stood for boarding. They would meet with President Taft,hopefully secure his agreement to intervene regarding shipping to the Port of Rotterdam, then return home and never again subject herself to the spectacle of Finn Delaney parading himself before the female population of Manhattan.
Finn strolled across the railway station platform like a peacock, deliberately soaking in the female attention coming from the other travelers, smiling and nodding at them.
“What a shame you must tear yourself away from your adoring entourage,” she said.
“Not at all,” he said. “Who wouldn’t rather share a compartment with sour lemons instead of pretty smiles? Oh, wait. I’ve got three hundred dollars burning a hole in my pocket. Care to take it from me?”
The clanging bells and steam whistles as the train pulled into the station made it too loud for her to respond. Irritation still crackled as she boarded the train and settled onto the bench that had been allotted to them. The passenger carriage was full this morning, so they were stuck together.
“Well?” Finn asked as soon as the attendant slid the door to their compartment closed. They were alone now, and she needed to give him an answer about the money.
He was right. Her refusal to take it made her small and petty, and it was time to stop letting him have the high ground in this matter.
She put her hand out, palm up.
A fleeting look of surprise lit his face, but it vanished when her expression didn’t soften. He rooted around in his pocket and came up with a fat wad of bills that he smacked into her palm.
“Thank you,” she said coldly, tucking the roll into her purse and turning to gaze out the window. The money would go straight to the CRB. If she deposited it into her account, it would feel like a capitulation.
The train jerked as it pulled out of the station, and Finn brushed up against her.
“Could you please move over onto your side of the bench?” she asked.
“With pleasure,” he muttered and scooted over.
It was going to be a long, difficult ride to New Haven.
18
Finn wasn’t going to let Delia’s snit get to him. She was still in a prissy mood when they arrived at the Yale campus, but he didn’t let it throw him off course. If he could maintain his focus while German pilots fired machine guns at him, he could keep his head screwed on with Delia.
Even though it smarted. They’d been working so well together that he’d begun nurturing the stupid hope of her forgiving him.
She had finally accepted the three hundred dollars, and yet there was no thaw in her arctic blast as they walked along old brick paths on the campus, still slick after a cold morning rain. Leafless trees lined the walkways, their skeletal branches releasing occasional droplets. Still, nothing could mar the splendor of the Gothic architecture throughout the sprawling campus.
