City of Promise Read Free Page B

in multicolored assortments, or everything done up to make you believe you were in an Oriental seraglio—even such places as those didn’t command Eileen’s prices.
    The fantasy Eileen Brannigan catered to was the one in a man’s most hidden heart: That a woman who looked and sounded and acted like the demure and chaste creature he thought he’d married would, once they were in the bedroom, behave as the willing, even lusty, companion of his most secret imagining. Such a woman was not only capable of making a man believe himself to be a god, she showed herself worthy to make the judgment. That was a pleasure so heady, supplying it meant Eileen Brannigan could name her price and get it.
    Add to that the one-client-per-evening rule that prevailed at Brannigan’s, and the house became as desirable for the women who worked there as for the men who patronized it. Eileen blessed the day she had thought up the scheme and found the courage to try it. But however successful, it was not a solution to the problem that faced her just then, with the applewood fire burning brightly and her niece sitting with her sewing on her lap, waiting to hear what her aunt had to say.
    “Your birthday is next week, Mollie. You will be eighteen.”
    “I know.” While threading a needle and rolling the end into a knot between her thumb and forefinger.
    “You are,” Eileen said, “approaching twenty. And twenty is spinsterhood. I do not believe, dear child, that is what you want.”
    “It’s not.” A home of her own and babies were what Mollie wanted. Meaning she had to have a husband. Faithful, mind you. Not someone who’d go running off to Brannigan’s or a lesser establishment at the first opportunity. But definitely a husband. “I wish,” Mollie said, “to be married. But only to the right sort of man.”
    “Well,” Eileen said, “given the circumstances, that is not a simple thing to find. You must face facts, Mollie. You are a bastard and you’ve been raised in a whorehouse. It was never going to be easy.”
    Mollie kept her eyes on her needlework, but her heart rose and sank, then rose again. It didn’t seem likely her aunt would have raised the subject if she didn’t have a prospect in mind. On the other hand, they had circled the topic any number of times in the past year. The issue was never resolved and the dream of herself as a bride and eventually a mother seemed unlikely to be fulfilled.
    “I’ve had an offer,” Eileen said. “The question is whether you will entertain the idea.”
    Mollie had been about to take a stitch. She stopped with the needle hovering in midair.
    “Max Merkel,” Eileen said.
    A few seconds went by. Mollie did not speak.
    “He’s considerably older than we might have wished,” Eileen conceded. “But his breweries are very successful. And—”
    “Mr. Merkel became a widower last year, didn’t he?” Mollie was not particularly interested in her suitor’s breweries. She had a vague notion he had two, possibly three, but that he could afford to visit Brannigan’s as often as twice a week said everything necessary about his financial status. “And his wife had been ill for a long time before that. That’s correct, isn’t it?”
    “On death’s door for at least five years,” Eileen said eagerly. She’d been afraid Merkel’s age and his unfashionable black beard and hispaunch would put Mollie off. As it was the girl was only raising her usual objection—that she could not see any point in marrying a man who had already proved himself incapable of fidelity. “Possibly six or seven years,” Eileen added. “No man could be expected to live like a monk for all that time, could he?”
    Mollie had lapsed back into silence. After a few moments she began to sew.
    “Well?” Eileen demanded.
    “I will talk to him.”

    The meeting—only herself and Mr. Merkel, Mollie insisted—took place on a Sunday night. Since Brannigan’s was always closed on the Sabbath the downstairs