But now, twice in less than a week.
Perhaps it was true.
If it was, it was all right with him.
He loved his wife. That was the only reason he went down to that house on South Street. To spare her the humiliation of having to endure him more than she wanted.
He lifted his drink again.
"Did you find out anything about Bertha's family today?" she asked.
Harrison Marlowe shook his head.
"There's no family anywhere. Perhaps in Europe, but we don't even know what town she came from."
Geraldine looked down at her drink. Its pale golden color glowed in the glass.
"How terrible," she said quietly. "What will happen to the child now?"
Harrison shrugged his shoulders.
"I don't know. I suppose I'll have to notify the authorities. She'll probably go to the county orphanage."
"We can't let that happen!" The words burst from Geraldine's lips involuntarily.
Harrison stared at her in surprise.
"Why not?" he asked.
"I don't see what else we can do."
"Why can't we just keep her?"
"You just can't," he said.
"There are certain legalities involved. An orphaned child isn't like a chattel. You can't keep her because she happens to be left at your house."
"You can speak to the authorities," Geraldine said. "I'm sure they would prefer to leave her with us rather than have her become a public charge."
"I don't know," Harrison said. "They might want us to adopt her to make sure that she doesn't become a charge."
"Harry, what a wonderful idea!" Geraldine smiled and got out of her chair, then walked to her husband.
"Now, why didn't I think of that?"
"Think of what?" "Adopting Rina," Geraldine said.
"I’m so proud of you. You have such a wonderful mind. You think of everything."
He stared at her speechlessly. She placed her arms around his neck. "But then you always wanted a little girl around the house, didn't you?
And Laddie would be so happy to have a little sister."
He felt the soft press of her body against him and the answering surge of warmth well up inside him.
She kissed him quickly on the lips, then, as quickly, turned her face away from him almost shyly as she felt his immediate response.
"Suddenly, I'm so excited," she whispered meaningfully, her face half hidden against his shoulder. "Do you think it would be all right if we had another Martini?"
Dandy Jim Callahan stood in the middle of his office, looking at them.
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
"I don't know," he said slowly. "It's a difficult thing you ask."
"But, surely, Mr. Mayor," Geraldine Marlowe said quickly, "you can do it." The mayor shook his head. "It's not so easy as you think, my dear lady. You forget the church has something to say about this, too.
After all, the mother was Catholic and you just can't take a Catholic child and turn it over to a Protestant family.
At least, not in Boston.
They'd never stand for it."
Geraldine turned away, the disappointment showing clearly in her face.
It was then for the first time that she saw her husband as something other than the nice young Harvard boy she had married.
He stepped forward and there appeared in his voice a quality of strength that she had never heard before.
"The church would like it even less if I were to prove that the mother was never a Catholic.
They'd look pretty foolish then, wouldn't they?"
The mayor turned to him. "You have such proof?"
"I have," Marlowe said. He took a sheet of paper out of his pocket. "The mother's passport and the child's birth certificate.
Both clearly state they were Protestant."
Dandy Jim took the papers from him and studied them.
"If you had these, why didn't you stop them?"
"How could I?" Marlowe asked. "I didn't receive them until today. The servants and Father Nolan made all the arrangements last night.
Besides, what difference does it make to the poor woman?
She's getting a Christian burial."