“Stop! You’re not selling information on me. It was at the soda counter at Dewey’s, and it was just a joke. Jesse’s a friend.”
Frankie put up his hands, surrendering. “I don’t have a problem with it. Jesse’s a good guy. The girls love him something crazy. See ya, Yankee girl.” Frankie walked to the door. I followed him out onto the street. I couldn’t stand it. I had to know.
“Say, Frankie, have you heard anything about Mother?”
“She’s been seen here and there. You know, Jo, you should stay close around Willie.”
“I do stay close to Willie.”
“She’s always had your back, and you should have hers too.” Frankie cracked his gum, gave me a salute with his long hand, and walked off down Royal.
I knew that Willie was Frankie’s biggest benefactor. So it only made sense that he stayed close to her and brought her info. But what was he implying by saying I should stay close to Willie? Patrick motioned to me through the window to come back in the store.
“You know, now it makes sense,” said Patrick. “Jesse comes by the store a lot, but he doesn’t buy anything. He just gets grease on the books. Isn’t he from some hillbilly town in Arkansas?”
“Alabama, and he doesn’t get grease on the books. You’re making that up.”
“Well, I guess he seems nice enough. He’s always smiling. Did you ever notice that?” said Patrick.
“No, I never noticed that.”
“Do you like him?”
“He’s just a friend,” I said.
Patrick nodded. “He’s got good teeth.” His thoughts reversed. “Hey, I ran into Miss Paulsen yesterday.”
Miss Paulsen was a professor at Loyola and a lady friend of Charlie’s. I had never met her, but Charlie once confided that he thought she was looking to develop their close friendship into a long-term commitment. She hired Patrick as her aide in the English department one year.
“Miss Paulsen went to Smith,” said Patrick.
“She did?”
“Yeah, I completely forgot about that. Anyway, I told her about you, and she said she would be happy to answer any questions you might have. She’s stopping by the shop later this week to pick up a book I ordered for her. You can speak to her then,” said Patrick.
“Oh, Patrick, thank you!” I made an awkward attempt to hug him because it seemed appropriate. He stood surprised, then put his arms around me and rested his chin on my shoulder.
TWENTY-FOUR
I had read the materials so many times, I practically had them memorized.
It is the aim of the Board of Admissions to have its entrance requirements flexible and thus make it possible for able girls to come to Smith from various types of schools and all parts of the country.
I looked at the word able. Able to meet the stringent requirements? Able to be accepted? Probably able to afford it, which I couldn’t.
The Board of Admissions attempts to select from the complete list of candidates those students whose records of character, health, and scholarship give evidence of their equipment for college.
Character. I knew I was one, but they wanted me to have one.
Health. Besides the occasional red beans and rice incident on the Gedricks’ sidewalk, I was healthy.
Scholarship. The one B in Mr. Proffitt’s class was going to haunt me. I could still feel his sticky mothball breath steaming over my desk. Did he eat rotten sweaters from his attic? “You must apply yourself, Miss Moraine,” he would say in his whispery tone. “You must seek the soul of the equation.” The soul of the equation? I wasn’t convinced that calculus had anything close to a soul. But I should have pretended and joined Mr. Proffitt for a meal of sweater vests. That B would dent my application.
Admission is based on the candidate’s record as a whole, the school record, the recommendations, the College Board tests, and other information secured by the college regarding general ability, personality, and health. All credentials should reach the Board of Admissions before March 1 if the student wishes to have her application considered at the April meeting by the Board of Admissions.
Before March. It was already February. Mardi Gras approached on February 21, and the parties and balls were already under way. Willie would be keeping the house open longer each day to cash in on the “high-time hoopla,” as she called it. She had extra seasonal girls arranged and two rooms reserved at the motel nearby. The girls would work in shifts, taking time to bathe and sleep a few hours at the motel in between. I’d still clean in the morning, but it would take longer, and there were always errands during Mardi Gras.
I stared out the window from the counter of the bookshop and watched the passersby. John Lockwell would also be busy during Mardi Gras. When I was in his office, I saw a photo of him with Rex, one of the oldest Mardi Gras krewes. If I didn’t get the recommendation letter before Mardi Gras festivities started, I wouldn’t get it at all.
Residence
Smith College has the policy of placing groups of students from each of the four classes in houses of its own. Each house has its own living room, dining room, kitchen and is supervised by the Head of the House.
The “Head of the House.” It sounded like Willie. I looked at the return address from Charlotte. She lived in Tenney House.
Expenses
Tuition fee $850
Residence fee $750
Books $25–$50
Subscriptions and dues $24
Recreation and incidentals $100
Enough. I slid the stack of papers under the counter. Looking at the expenses made my stomach churn. Nearly two thousand dollars. Eight thousand dollars for four years. My life savings in the cigar box was less than three hundred dollars. Sure, I always had seven cents for the streetcar and a nickel for a soda, but two thousand dollars for one year? Willie said she’d pay for Newcomb or Loyola, but they were a third of the cost of Smith. I would apply for financial assistance and scholarships. They’d be my only hope. Somehow I had to turn the salted peanuts in the cigar box into petits fours.
I stared out the window. A woman in a smart suit crossed the street toward the shop. I estimated her to be in her midfifties. People naturally parted from her course as she made her way to the door. Literary fiction. I put my thumb on the counter, signaling to Patrick, who wasn’t there. Habit.
“Good afternoon,” I said as she pushed through the door.
The woman cut a path straight toward me. She placed her pocketbook on the counter and smiled. It was a polite smile, but reserved, as if her teeth desperately wanted to peek out, but she wouldn’t let them. Her hesitation indicated appraisal. Her head tilted slightly as she looked at me. The hair at her temples was pulled tightly toward her bun. The skin was stretched like flesh-colored taffy.
“Miss Moraine?”
I nodded.
“I’m Barbara Paulsen, chair of the English department at Loyola. Patrick Marlowe was my aide for a year.”
“Oh, yes. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Patrick tells me you went to Smith.”
“Indeed.” Her head tilted again, this time in the opposite direction. Full evaluation. “And he tells me you’re applying. You’re quite late, you know. Most girls apply before their senior year of high school.”
“Yes, but I’ll make the March deadline.”
“Patrick said your grades are strong. And your extra- curriculars?”
I stared at her.
“You do have extracurricular activities for your application? Achievement awards?”
I shook my head and continued shaking as she sprayed me with student council, language club, social committee, and all the other affiliations that any girl applying to an East Coast school would have.
“My extracurricular was limited. I had to work several jobs during school,” I explained. Limited? More like non
existent.
“I see. What other forms of employment did you have besides working here at the bookstore?”
She was asking if I could afford it, which I couldn’t. I looked at the hair tearing at her temples and tried to formulate a safe answer. “I work as a housemaid in one of the homes here in the Quarter.”
Miss Paulsen didn’t react with the shock or horror I expected. She seemed to appreciate my candor and fiddled with the strap on her pocketbook. “Patrick explained that your father is absent. What about your mother, dear?”
Mother? Oh, she’s in a dusty motel in California right now, cooling herself with a cold Schlitz in her cleavage.
“My mother . . . cleaned homes as well,” I told her. “She’s pursuing employment out of state at this time.”
Silence ticked between us until she spoke. “Charlie Marlowe and I are old friends. Patrick was one of the best students I’ve ever had. He’s not the writer his father is, but he knows literature, and I think he’d make an excellent editor. I’ve always encouraged him in that direction but—” She stopped and waved the topic away with her hand. “What I’m saying is that I have the utmost respect for Patrick, and he seems to have the utmost respect for you.” Confusion dangled from the end of her sentence.
“Patrick and I have been close friends for a long time,” I explained.
“Are you dating him?” The words came out quickly, too quickly, and she knew it. And there was something else pulsing behind her question. Not jealousy exactly. Some sort of curiosity? “Not that it’s my business, certainly,” she added.
“Oh, I don’t mind the question. We’re just friends,” I assured her.
“I’ve just always wondered why he stayed in New Orleans. Everything’s okay with his father?”
“Perfectly.” I smiled.
“Good. I’d like Charlie to visit my writing class again this year.”
I imagined Charlie at the head of the lecture hall in his underwear, clutching the heart-shaped box to his chest.
“Well, you’ll need some strong recommendations for your application. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to write one for you. I’ve already written one for a girl at Sacred Heart, you see, and that recommendation would be diluted if I were to write another one. But I do encourage you with your application, Miss Moraine. These exercises, no matter how futile, build character.”
Futile. She was telling me it was useless. That I was useless.
“I believe you have a book for me?” she prompted. “I paid in advance when I ordered it.”
I had seen the book—Le Deuxième Sexe by a French author, Simone de Beauvoir. Patrick had ordered it from a press in Paris. He said it was an analysis of women. I took the keys from my pocket and walked toward the bookcase. I opened the glass door and pulled the book from the shelf. I felt a warm shadow behind me. Miss Paulsen was inches from my back.
She pointed over my shoulder. “A Passage to India. What edition? I’d like to see that as well.” She held out her hand.
TWENTY-FIVE
I was a liar.
I’m sorry, Miss Paulsen. A Passage to India is currently under restoration. No, Patrick, I don’t know who Mother was with near the Roosevelt Hotel. Yes, Jesse, I’m going to meet Patrick tonight. No, Willie, I didn’t know Mother had left for California. No, Detective Langley, I didn’t find Forrest Hearne’s watch under my mother’s bed, a bed in a brothel with a bullet hole in the headboard.
It went on. Each lie I told required another to thicken the paste over the previous. It was useless, like when I learned to crochet and made a long string of loops. Being useless builds character, Miss Paulsen had said. Perhaps she was home now, drinking a weak Earl Grey from last night’s tea bag, massaging her taffied scalp.
I sat on my bed, staring at A Passage to India in my lap. How foolish of me to keep the book downstairs in the shop. But the pieces still didn’t fit together. If Forrest Hearne hadn’t come to Willie’s, then how did the watch end up in Mother’s room? If Mother knew about the watch, she certainly wouldn’t have left it. No, it would have been quite the complement to Cincinnati’s wardrobe of death. And Frankie said Mother had been at the Roosevelt Hotel on New Year’s Eve.
I crawled under my bed and pulled back the loose floorboard. I wrestled my hand through the opening, retrieved the cigar box, and inserted the book in its place. I made room for the box of money in the bottom of one of my desk drawers. Two things volleyed in my head:
Mr. Hearne hadn’t thought I was useless.
Someone who had been with Forrest Hearne had been at Willie’s.
• • •
Preparations for Mardi Gras swelled. People celebrated the oncoming festivities. For fourteen days, I carried John Lockwell’s business card in my pocket, vowing to call and inquire about the letter. For fourteen nights, I lay in bed, certain I could hear the telltale watch ticking under the floorboard.
Willie’s house was filthier each day as Mardi Gras approached. I arrived at five A.M. and saw cars parked deep in the belly of the long driveway. Willie rarely allowed cars in the drive. She said it was an excuse for cops to look at the house. Fortunately, the police became more lax around Mardi Gras.
The girls worked late and slept late. Evangeline had settled into her new room. It no longer smelled like Mother. Willie was exhausted, but I didn’t dare deviate from our normal schedule. I held the coffee tray and tapped the bottom of her door with my foot.
“That better be my coffee, and it better be hot.”
I pushed through the door and found Willie sitting up in bed, surrounded by bulging stacks of cash.
“Shut that door. I don’t need the girls seeing this green. They’ll ask for a bonus—like I don’t know they’re all pocketing extra on the side as it is. Do I have ‘Stupid’ tattooed on my forehead?” She dropped her hands in her lap. “Well, what do you have?”
“The usual Mardi Gras leftovers.” I emptied my apron pockets on her bed. Single cuff links, silk ties, lighters, party invitations, hotel keys, and a bulging money clip.
Willie reached for the money clip and counted the contents. “That’s the Senator’s. Seal it in a plain envelope and give it to Cokie. Have him deliver it to the Pontchartrain Hotel. That’s where he’s staying. We’re lucky he was with Sweety and not Evangeline. What else?”
“Evangeline’s pillowcases are torn.”
“Yeah, she had the scratcher last night,” said Willie.
“Speaking of Evangeline,” I began carefully, “I noticed she’s got some new jewelry in her box.”
“It’s not stolen. She’s got a big man.”
“Someone new?” I asked.
“No, he comes by every once in a while.” Willie placed a tall stack near the end of the bed and continued sorting. “Three thousand. Bring me a warm washcloth. This cash is filthy.”
“Evangeline’s new date is a jeweler?” I called from the bathroom.
“Nah, he’s a developer from Uptown. Builds hotels and shopping centers. I don’t like him. He’s got a twisted need for power. But he throws cash like rice.”
I stood at Willie’s bedside and cleaned her hands with the warm cloth. She leaned back against her pillows and sighed.
“Willie, your hands are swollen. What happened?”
“They’re yeasty. Too much salt.” She pulled her hands from my grasp and quickly gathered up the bills, stacking and rubber-banding them by denomination. “I cleared three grand just last night. If this keeps going, it’ll be the best season yet. The safe is open. Put these in and bring me the green box from the bottom shelf.”
Three thousand dollars. Willie earned a year of tuition to Smith in one night. I placed the stacks in the safe next to the other rows of cash and grabbed the green box she requested. The word Adler’s was etched in gold on the top. I knew Adler’s. It was an upscale jewel
ry store on Canal. Everything was beautiful and expensive. I had never set foot in Adler’s, but I sometimes looked in the window. I handed the box to Willie.
“Shall I tell Sadie about Evangeline’s pillowcases?” I asked, gathering up two glasses from Willie’s desk.
“Cut the act. You’re not thinking about pillowcases right now,” said Willie.
I sucked in a breath. I put the glasses back down on the desk so she wouldn’t see my hands shaking.
“You may think some things slide by me, Jo, but they don’t. I’ve been in this game a long time, and my mind is like a trap.”
I nodded.
“Stop hiding near the desk. Come here,” she barked. I approached her high bed.
“Here.” She thrust the green box at me. “Open it.”
The top creaked and popped open on its hinges. Wrapped across a white bed of satin was a beautiful gold watch. The words Lady Elgin curved in a soft arc across the face. It was the female companion to Forrest Hearne’s watch.
She knew. This was her way of telling me she knew. I drew a breath. I couldn’t look at her.
“Well?” she commanded.
“It’s beautiful, Willie. Do you want me to put it on you now? I know you hate small clasps.”
“Me? What are you talking about? Don’t you have something to say, idiot?”
The jig was up. “Willie, I’m sorry—”
“Shut up. I don’t need to hear it. Take the watch and say thank you. You think your good-for-nothin’ mother will remember? No. But don’t go expecting something every year. Eighteen is a milestone. And don’t show the girls. They’ll just start whining about a trip to Adler’s, and I need them to be focused tonight. Valentine’s Day is always a doozy. Don’t forget to pull the decorations from the attic. Why are you just standing there? What, you need to hear me say it? Happy birthday. There. Now, get the hell out.”
My birthday. I hadn’t forgotten, just thought others would. I backed up toward the door. “Thank you, Willie. It’s beautiful.”
“Well, take the glasses. Just because you’re eighteen doesn’t mean you can fall down on the job. And remember something else, Jo.”