The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba(67)
I smile at the apt comparison. “Something like that.”
“She’s not quite what I expected. Will’s paper makes her sound like a delicate flower, but there’s some steel in that spine.”
“There would have to be, wouldn’t there? To survive what she’s been through. Decker says she came up with the plan for her escape entirely on her own,” I murmur to Rafael, careful to keep from speaking too loudly lest anyone overhear us. “They couldn’t figure out how to get her out, so apparently they sent her a note with the hope they’d get some ideas. Instead, she sent them a detailed plan and a diagram.”
Rafael laughs. “I’d have liked to see their faces when they opened that. Well, she’d better be ready for the fuss that’s being drummed up. Every reporter in the city is digging into her past right now, trying to find something to discredit her story.”
Pulitzer already sent me two notes at my aunt’s house asking for a meeting, which I promptly ignored. For better or worse, my loyalties now lie with the Journal.
“That’s the problem with putting someone on a pedestal,” Rafael adds. “No one can live up to those expectations.”
I study Evangelina carefully onstage. As closely as she and Karl stand together and given the obvious intimacy between them, the rumors about the true nature of their relationship likely won’t be put to bed. I can’t help but feel badly for her, for how much of her life has been defined by others’ actions, for the fact that she must now pretend to be the version of herself that we all have created.
“She’s young,” I say. “She’s alone. Her father’s been imprisoned for years, her family torn apart by this war. The conditions of the prison where she was held are indisputably wretched. Her story is interesting enough without all of this.” I wave my hands around me, gesturing at the spectacle.
“Will does like his fireworks.”
“He does. But sometimes I worry that we lose sight of the subject of our stories when we sensationalize them. I don’t think any publisher works as hard as he does. He’s passionate about the news, about the stories we cover. I know there are those who say he’s just in it for the money or to increase the paper’s circulation, but I don’t know if I believe that anymore. There’s something quixotic about him. But that can be dangerous, too.”
“As it happens, I agree with you. Will’s going to change the world or die trying.”
“I rather thought that was a politician’s job,” I say dryly. “Perhaps if he is so intent on reshaping the world order, he misses seeing things as they are rather than as he would make them. Evangelina is smart. She wouldn’t have escaped the prison if she wasn’t. If you listen to her story—there were multiple times when she convinced the Spanish to be lenient with her father throughout his imprisonment. It was her desire to ask for American citizenship when she came here because she understood that it would offer her some protection. Why don’t we celebrate that as opposed to presenting her as this helpless victim in need of rescue when she’s clearly able to rescue herself?”
“Will is very good at understanding what the public wants and giving it to them. They’re drawn to the salacious stories; to the dramatic rescues and the damsels in distress. People might want to be informed when they read the news, but they also want to be entertained. You don’t know what it’s like to spend twelve hours working in a factory somewhere, body aching, worrying about every damn thing. When you read the news, you don’t want to read about every arcane policy disagreement. You want to feel. That’s how you win the people.” He gestures toward Evangelina. “I have a feeling she understands that, too.”
There is something in the manner in which she plays to the crowd even as she seems overwhelmed by the attention, the different versions of her that don’t quite seem to line up.
“People like you and me,” Rafael continues. “We see things for what they are, and we appreciate the simplicity of them. We’re realists. She and Will are made for this in a way.
“For you, truth is the end. You have a firmly seated sense of justice that I imagine is very difficult to shake.” He shrugs. “Problem with that is justice means different things to different people. Same with truth. Will’s learned that and how to use it to his advantage. You’re still grappling with which side of things you want to be on.”
I gape at him, unsure of how to respond. It’s easy to view him through a shallow lens, but I recognize how false that is when he hits on something I hadn’t quite worked out myself.
“The right side, of course,” I reply.
He smiles, and for a moment, I wonder if he’s one of the first people in a long time to truly see me.
“Speaking of—has Will dashed off already?” Rafael asks me, changing subjects. “I thought his French motorcar was out front at Delmonico’s.”
The first of its kind in New York, Hearst’s motorcar is legendary in a city where everyone flaunts their wealth and status for all the world to see.
“He has. Everyone looked a little bewildered by the fact. I think they expected the man who demands fireworks to make a little more of a spectacle of himself.”
Rafael laughs. “Not his style. It’s a shame, though. I was hoping I’d run into him.”