“The devil was in me that time, and I kept scratching and biting and carrying on.” Now the tears come, hot and fast. “I couldn’t believe he’d really do it. But he did, he whupped her awful, and on top of that, he fired her without a reference to get back at me. I never saw her again.”
It proves impossible not to reach out a tentative hand. She takes it, takes several seconds, and wipes her eyes with her sleeve.
“I got as far away as I could,” she continues.
“That has a familiar ring.”
“When I first applied here, I used my real name. And when I explained what happened, I asked Mavereen if I could be Miss Christina hereabouts, no last name, since anything that called Anton to mind was a powerful woe, even the “Mrs.” She said yes, and made a fuss over me. But then about five years ago, Rooster got hired, and I . . . I fell for him. He fell right back. I been yearning to marry that man for so long, it’s put years on me.”
“Well, whyever don’t you, then? Surely—”
“She won’t let us!” Miss Christina stifles another sob. “Says in God’s eyes, I’m yet married, Miss James. Unless I get a divorce, or find out Anton’s dead. Says if we were caught fornicating, we’d be cut loose.”
I’m about to ask how she could ever know such a thing when I think back—to Blossom’s cautions about debauches, to real warnings I half took for jokes.
The maids.
Mavereen’s eyes. Everywhere, throughout the Paragon Hotel. Who knew when one would be walking down a hallway, starched and alert? Who knew what they could hear from outside a thin door?
How does a body dare to dirty bedsheets when you know exactly who’ll be washing them?
“But that’s cruel. And absurd,” I say slowly.
“She’s not cruel. But the Bible’s real important to her. More important than me and Rooster, that’s certain. Maybe . . . maybe more important than anything.”
Still holding her hand, I rub at the back lightly. This puts Blossom’s aversion to discussing the Rose’s Thorn in a different, dare I say blinding, light.
Mavereen Meader approves of many things, I hear her saying. She does not approve of others.
“All right,” I continue. “Mavereen won’t allow any of the marital whoopee; meanwhile you’re dangling in each other’s sight like carrots every day. I take it the problem is money?”
Staring at a garden she never expects to have, she nods. “Took me eight months scrubbing floors before I found this place. Rooster was lifting crates at the docks. And we want a farm so I can cook for us, sell produce and milk and eggs, maybe even start a grocery. He sends a little every month to an older couple keen to go live with their daughter. They’ve arranged he’ll get the money back if another buyer comes along. We’ll never pay them in time.”
“You might. So I take it Blossom approached you with some sort of offer?”
Miss Christina shuts her eyes in despair. “She wanted Rooster to let her into Max’s room so she could copy his cabin key, about six months back. Said she needed it so she could leave a present there for him and gave us twenty whole dollars to keep quiet. Twenty dollars for practically nothing. We thought it queer, but were glad of the extra savings. And we trust her. She said she knew we needed it. When Davy went missing, I recollected that she’d asked me to dress him in his hiking boots—which that walk didn’t warrant, but I didn’t fuss about. Then I remembered it was funny she’d paid us so much when we’d have done it for free. So I asked Max if he’d gotten any surprise gifts in the last six months and he didn’t know what I was on about. Then I went to see Blossom, and.”
“What did she say?”
She grimaces. “You know how she is. Said how dare I ask, and that I was crazy. That she just lost the key and forgot the notion. And that anyhow, we were paid plenty handsome to do it, so anybody we blabbed to would blame us.”
“And?” I question, hearing worse stuck at the back of her throat.
Miss Christina now stares numbly ahead, chewing her knuckle. “And that if we ratted, she’d tell Mavereen that Rooster and I were having an affair. We aren’t. We write letters.”
I recall how frantic Blossom was when Max announced he