Levi felt that anything he said would be inadequate. He didn’t know the words to make that expression on her face go away, that crumpled, bruised look. Amelia didn’t crumple, usually, and she never seemed to bruise. But this . . . she felt responsible. He didn’t know what to do to take that away.
“You couldn’t know what would happen,” Levi said finally. He could taste the bland uselessness of these words.
“You knew,” she said, suddenly fierce. “You tried to tell me.”
“I didn’t know it would be like that,” he said. “I was . . .”
He trailed off. Telling her he was worried about her seemed too close to a confession, too close to telling her how he felt. It wouldn’t help, that confession, and it might even make her flee. She seemed balanced on a knife-edge—the burden of his feelings might cause her to fall.
“I thought it might be too much for you to be seen by so many. I knew that it couldn’t be undone,” he said.
“And I told you that it was my choice,” Amelia said. “But I was too foolish to understand what I was choosing.”
Levi felt helpless against her grief. He had no right to touch her, to comfort her. He could not find the words to console her. It was as if she were still under glass on the stage, separated from him and the rest of the world.
He had no power to make her stay, and neither did Barnum—that was abundantly clear. Barnum’s powers of persuasion were useless in her case. She’d always viewed Barnum askance, recognizing the slick oil that was at least half of his personality.
Amelia didn’t need Barnum in the same way he needed her. That gave her power over him. But Levi wanted her to stay. He didn’t have the ability to wipe clean her grieving heart, but he wanted her to stay.
“Stay,” he said. The word emerged without his conscious thought, a thing he’d never meant to say out loud. And then again—“Stay.”
She looked at him then, and she was Amelia, cool and direct and demanding. “Why?”
So many reasons I cannot say. The words lodged inside his throat, and he fell back on platitudes.
“Because we’ll make it safer. It will be better next time.”
She looked doubtful. “How can you be assured of that? One thing I have learned in all my years among humans is that their behavior is not predictable.”
“Yes, it is,” Levi said. “If it weren’t, we couldn’t build societies. We expect each other to behave a certain way, and so we do.”
“Then how do mobs happen?” Amelia asked. “How do people suddenly decide to join together and rampage?”
He recognized that this was a sincere question, not a rhetorical one. She didn’t understand people, even after so many years of living among them. Well, to be fair, there couldn’t have been many mob scenes in that isolated village of hers.
“We expect certain behaviors of each other,” he said slowly, thinking about his answer as he spoke. “I think, when something happens like at the Concert Hall, one person behaves out of the normal fashion. Then another person thinks it must be acceptable, and so they copy that behavior. And so it goes on and on like a chain of fire until everyone’s caught it.”
“And how do you think we can keep the fire from starting again?” Amelia said.
“We take certain precautions, like Barnum said,” Levi said. He saw the angry flicker in her eyes when he mentioned Barnum. “We hire guards. We make it clear that there will be acceptable standards. I find that when the rules are clear, most people will follow them. They don’t want to be censured by their fellow man. And . . .”
He hesitated, because he knew she wouldn’t like this, and it might be the wrong thing to say. It might be the thing that drove her away.
“And?” she asked.
“I’m sorry to say this, because I know you like your freedom, but I don’t think you should go about on your own anymore. If you’re alone, you might be mobbed again.”
She gave a little shudder, and he knew she felt the crowd pressing all around her again.
“No,” Amelia said. “I don’t like it. But I have to agree that it is not wise for me to walk without an escort. Charity prefers that I have one, in any case. She seems to think it’s improper otherwise.”
“Does that mean you’ll stay?” Levi asked.
It was pathetic, the way he couldn’t keep the hope out of his voice. It made him wince.
She stood then, a smooth, fluid motion that left him feeling awkward as he scrambled up beside her.
She stepped out of her shoes, pulled off her dress, and dove into the water.
He watched for a sign of her, for her tail arcing into the air, but there was nothing.
Still, he felt that she hadn’t left forever. He believed (perhaps foolishly) that she would have said good-bye. She wouldn’t have said it to Barnum, but she would have told him. He’d earned at least that courtesy.
No, she was only pretending she was still free to act as she had done before—to swim without eyes on her, to be a mermaid in the sea instead of in a tank.
He waited. He must have nodded off, for suddenly she was there again, pulling herself onto the dock and calmly dressing as if he weren’t there.
Then she faced him, and he offered his arm. She linked her own with his, and he breathed in her saltwater perfume and believed that in that moment he was the most fortunate man in New York.
CHAPTER 8
Amelia thought to steal back into her guest room and present herself at breakfast as though nothing had happened. Whatever argument she might have with Barnum—and there was still an argument there, for he was certainly confused about who owned her other than herself—she was reluctant to involve Charity in it.
Amelia found the door to the apartment unlocked (almost as if Barnum expected me to come back) and said good night to Levi there. She sensed a reluctance in him to leave, but Barnum had arranged for Dr. Griffin to stay at the Park Hotel. There were sure to be reporters there waiting despite the hour. Levi had told her on the walk home that the sensation of the mermaid would guarantee that.
“You shouldn’t have to answer their questions if you don’t wish to,” Amelia said.
“That is what Barnum pays me to do,” Levi said. “To talk to reporters, even if it is the middle of the night.”
“How did you come to meet him?” she asked.
“Oh, we are friends of old. I was working as a lawyer and Barnum hired me to help him with another exhibit. I could talk on most subjects, and that seemed handy to Barnum,” Levi said easily.
There was a glibness to his response that told her it wasn’t the entire story, but Levi didn’t seem inclined to continue. He must be speaking of the Joice Heth exhibit, which he had told her of previously. This was a topic of the utmost sensitivity for both Barnum and Levi. It occurred to her then that Levi, too, was irritated with Barnum and his present behavior.
Levi had confided in her that Barnum had promised him that Amelia would not be treated like Joice—that is, a possession to be used as Barnum saw fit. Amelia had no intention of allowing herself to be treated thus, but it was a comfort to know that Levi was on her side. She should tell him so, she thought. He should know that she appreciated what he did for her.
Then she remembered the way he’d asked her to stay and thought better of it. If she wasn’t careful, if she didn’t maintain the proper distance, he might believe she would welcome his attentions.