The Last Days of Night(72)

He leaned in and kissed her.





I do not think you can name many great inventions that have been made by married men.

—NIKOLA TESLA



THE NEXT MORNING was a strange one. Paul woke late, having slept fitfully on the downstairs couch. When he lifted his head from the stiff pillows, he could already smell the coffee boiling in its tin pot. By the time he’d dressed and made his way to the kitchen, he found Agnes and Erastus engaged in conversation. The mood was casual, familial. Paul attempted to read Agnes. He thought of her lips, her fingers, the feeling of her body pressed against his as they held each other close. When she looked at him in the kitchen, did her mind race to such scenes too? In her smile he found no clues. She said her hello, smiled warmly, and then turned back to Erastus’s discussion of Tesla. Erastus had ideas about the peculiar nature of Tesla’s mind. Teresa of ávila had suffered similar hallucinations. Might Tesla be blessed with a divine sight, as she had been?

They passed the morning in conversation with Paul’s parents until heading off to catch their noon train. After they had said farewell to Tesla and Ruth, Erastus took Paul and Agnes to the station in silence before offering his typically formal goodbye.

Paul spent a few cents on newspapers and a baked bun as they waited on the platform. He needed to say something about the previous night, but he didn’t know what. Or how. Should he apologize? Should he admit to having been ungentlemanly, given that she was soon to be engaged? Or should he tell her, one time, just so that the words might be loosed into the air, that he was in love with her?

“Miss Huntington,” said Paul, fumbling. “I mean Agnes—”

“He’s proud of you, you know,” she said.

“What?” he asked.

“Your father is terribly proud of you, whether you realize it or not.”

Clearly, his family had made some sort of impression on her. Perhaps, Paul thought, in the absence of her own family, she looked longingly to his.

Paul scoffed. “I find that hard to believe.”

“You think that he’s cold.”

“I think that when he is reminded I exist, I am a terrible disappointment to him.”

“How often has he come to see you in New York?”

Paul considered. “Once. On Fisk business.”

“Or maybe that’s how he put it to you.”

“Why wouldn’t he just tell me he wanted to see me?”

“God. You’re so…manlike. Listen. Did you ever think that perhaps he doesn’t think you’re proud of him?”

The suggestion was absurd. “What in the world are you talking about?”

“You were the one who left, Paul. Not him. Imagine how he felt about that.”

“What did he think I was going to do?”

“Teach at Fisk, preach in Nashville. He thinks you were the one who rejected him, and it’s your approval for which he is wanting.”

“That makes no sense at all. How could he think that?”

“Because,” said Agnes as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, “the two of you are pretty much exactly alike.”

Paul was quiet. No one had ever compared him to his father before.

“You should tell him,” she said.

“That I’m proud of him?”

“That you respect him. That he’s a good man, and an admirable one, and that you’ve always known that. That he’s your family, and New York is just the place you’ve chosen to live.”

Paul thought about this. How could Agnes, who’d met the man only the day before, know his father better than he did?

“I’ll try.”

This seemed enough for her.

“And…about last night,” she said. “There’s nothing you need to say. Nothing I expect you to do. This is where we are. This is who we are. I wish things were different, and I know you do too.”

“I’m sorry that I kissed you.”

“I’m not.”

And then they both looked down. The feeling was too great to handle politely.

Paul looked at the newspaper stand beside him. A small headline, below the middle fold, instantly grabbed his attention.

Paul turned to the signboard that announced the schedule of arrivals and departures.

“I’m so sorry,” he said. “I have to go. There’s a train in five minutes.” His mind was a jumble.

Agnes looked confused. “The Number Five doesn’t leave for almost an hour.”

“I’m going to Buffalo.” He grabbed the newspaper and obliviously overpaid the boy behind the counter. “Look. There’s been a murder. The article says that a Mr. William Kemmler, of Buffalo, has just been convicted of butchering his wife with an axe.”

Agnes frowned as she read. “So?”

“So if he is sentenced to death, then he’ll be executed with an A/C-powered electrical chair.”

She looked up at him, knowing full well what this would mean for Paul. And for Tesla. “Go,” she said.

He stood. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I wanted to…I should say…”

She waved him off. “Go.”

“Goodbye, Miss Huntington,” he said as he grabbed his luggage. His formality felt instantly ridiculous. “You’ll be all right getting back to the city on your own?”