“It is,” he said, as a tureen wafting a delectably scented steam was brought to the table, and a ladleful of soup placed in his bowl. He tasted it—the broth was rich and well-seasoned, the oysters fat and buttery. “It’s delicious.”
“I’m glad you like it.”
He was touched by the gesture, and something about the stew—such a humble, honest dish, made more humble and honest in this overwrought dining room, with its long, shining table that could have accommodated twenty but instead sat only two, its bowls of fresh-cut flowers wherever he looked—and the kindness that had inspired it made him feel warmly toward Charles, made him want to offer him something in return. “Do you know,” he began, accepting a second serving of the stew, “that I was born quite near here?”
“I wondered,” Charles said. “You had earlier mentioned your parents died when you were still young.”
“Yes, in seventy-one. I was five, John was four, and Eden was two.”
“Was it the flu?”
“Yes—they died so fast. My grandfather took us in immediately afterward.”
Charles gave a shake of his head. “The poor man—to lose his son and daughter-in-law—”
“Yes, and to be saddled with three little devils, all in less than a month!”
Charles laughed. “I’m sure you weren’t.”
“Oh, but we were. Though, as difficult as I was, John was worse.”
They both laughed at this, and he found himself, as he’d not done in some time, recounting the few memories he had of his parents: They had both worked for Bingham Brothers, his father as a banker, his mother as a lawyer. In his memories, they were always leaving—in the morning, to work; in the evening, to dinners and parties or to the opera or theater. He had a vague, gauzy image of his mother as a neat, slender woman with a long, straight nose and masses of dark hair, but he could never be certain whether this was truly his memory of her, or whether it was one he had constructed based on a small drawing of her that he had been given when she died. Of his father, he could remember even less. He knew he was fair-haired and green-eyed—his grandfather had adopted him as an infant from a German family in his employ with too many children and too little money, and had raised him alone—and that it was from him that David and his siblings had inherited their coloring. He remembered that he had been gentle, but also more playful than their mother, and that on Sundays, after they’d returned from church, he would have David and John stand in front of him as he stretched out two closed fists. They would get to choose—David one week, John the next—which fist secreted candy, and if they guessed incorrectly, he would always turn to walk away, and they would protest, and he would return, smiling, and distribute it to them anyway. Grandfather would always say that David was like their father in temperament, and John and Eden resembled their mother.
Mentioning his siblings led to a discussion of them, and he described how John and Peter had grown increasingly alike in sensibility and habit in the years since they married, and how they both worked for Bingham Brothers—in an echo of their parents, John was a banker and Peter a lawyer. Then there was Eden, and her studies at medical school, and Eliza’s charitable work. Charles knew of their names—everyone did, for they were always appearing in the society columns, spotted attending this gala or hosting that costume party, Eden written of admiringly for her sense of style and wit, John for his conversational skills—and asked if he was fond of them, and although David was not overly concerned with Charles’s opinion, he found himself fibbing and saying he was.
“And so you and Eden are the rebels, then, for not entering the family business. Or perhaps John is the rebel, for he is outnumbered, after all!”
“Yes,” he said, but he was growing anxious, for he knew the direction the conversation would now take, and before Charles could ask, he offered, “I did want to work with my grandfather—I did. But I—” And, to his embarrassment and horror, he was unable to speak further.
“Well,” said Charles, quietly, into the silence David had left, “but you are a wonderful artist, I am told, and artists should not spend their lives toiling in banks. I’m sure your grandfather would agree. Why, if any member of my family were to ever demonstrate any artistic skill in the slightest, you can be certain we wouldn’t expect them to spend their time tallying numbers and charting sea routes and appeasing traders and brokering arrangements! But, sadly, it seems that there is very little chance of that, as the Griffiths are, I’m sorry to say, workaday people in the extreme!” He laughed, and the mood grew lighter, and David, having recovered himself, finally laughed with him, feeling a swell of gratitude for Charles.
“Practicality is a virtue,” he said.
“Perhaps. But too much practicality, like too much of any virtue, is very dull, I think.”
After their dinner and drinks, Charles walked him down to the entryway. David could tell, from the way he tarried, the way Charles held his hand in both of his, that he wished to kiss him, and although he had had a pleasant evening, although he could even admit to himself that he liked the man, indeed, liked him very much, he was unable to stop himself from looking up at Charles’s face, flushed red from wine, and the stomach that not even his cleverly cut waistcoat could conceal, and comparing him unfavorably with Edward, his spare, slim frame, his smooth, pale skin.
Charles would not demand affection from him, he knew, and so David merely put his other hand atop Charles’s own in what he hoped was a conclusive gesture, and thanked him for a lovely evening.
If Charles was disappointed, he did not betray it. “You are most welcome,” he said. “Seeing you has been a bit of happiness for me in a very trying year.”
“But the year is young.”
“True. Though, if you might see me again, it would guarantee that it will only improve.”
He knew that he ought to say yes, or if not yes, that he must tell Charles he would have to decline his offer of marriage, and was so deeply grateful for it and honored by it—and he was—and wished him every happiness and good fortune.
But for the second time that evening, speech failed him, and Charles, as if understanding that David’s silence was a kind of acquiescence, merely bent and kissed his hand and opened the door to the chilled night, where the Binghams’ second coachman stood on the sidewalk, snow speckling his black coat, patiently holding open the hansom door.
X
Over the next week （as he had the week before）， he wrote every day to Edward. Edward had promised that he would send him his sister’s address in his first letter, but he had been gone almost two weeks and there had been not a single piece of correspondence. David had inquired at the boardinghouse if they had an address for him, and had even suffered an encounter with the terrifying Matron, but neither had yielded further information. And yet he continued to write, a letter a day, which he had one of the servants leave at Edward’s boardinghouse in case he should inform them of his location.
He could feel his aimlessness transforming itself into desperation, and every evening he set himself a plan for the following day, one that would keep him away from Washington Square until just past the first post delivery, by which point he would be either alighting from the hansom or rounding the corner on foot, returning from his trip to the museum, or the club, or a chat with Eliza, who was the sibling he liked best and to whom he sometimes paid a visit when he knew Eden was attending class. Grandfather had, pointedly, asked him nothing about his dinner with Charles Griffith, and nor had David volunteered anything. Life resumed its pre-Edward rhythms, but this time, the days were grayer than before. Now he made himself wait until half past the hour when the mail arrived before finally ascending the stairs, and he made himself not ask Adams or Matthew whether anything had come for him, as if, by not doing so, he might cause a letter to materialize to reward him for his discipline and patience. But day after day passed, and the post brought only two letters from Charles, both asking if he might want to attend the theater: The first one he declined, courteously and quickly, begging family obligations; the second he ignored, angry at it for not being from Edward, until he was on the verge of being rude, whereupon he jotted a brief note apologizing and saying he had caught a chill and was staying indoors.