Ah. Each bottle of Chianti from Mr. Parducci, then, costs ten cents. Each drink from that bottle, poured by Jessie’s girls into tiny thimbles, will cost the gentlemen two bits. After two drinks of the stuff, most won’t notice the expense. And Jessie’s girls will make sure they imbibe at least two drinks.
Why should Zhu be surprised? San Francisco, 1895, is capitalism at its finest hour. Yet she has to laugh. Food and water rationing in her Now—corrupt officials, markups through the roof--isn’t so very different from capitalism at its finest hour.
Not so very different. Does this mean people haven’t changed so much in six centuries?
But surely men and women and their relationships with each other have changed. Haven’t they?
Surely women like Zhu have changed. Perhaps Daniel can change, too?
“You work at Miss Malone’s, eh bella?” the wine merchant asks, handing her a receipt. He’s a handsome graying man, though he’s eaten a bit too well over the years and is probably due for his coronary arrest anytime soon. Well, maybe not. They’ve actually proven in Zhu’s Now that consumption of wine, especially red wine, is good for the circulation. “You too nice to work at that place.” He surreptitiously hands her a coin as his dark, round wife watches them suspiciously. “Nice girl, you go find work in a nice house up on Snob Hill. You good washee washee girl, no?”
“Actually, no, Mr. Parducci,” Zhu says. “I am Miss Malone’s bookkeeper and administrative assistant. Sometime I negotiate contracts on her behalf, as well.” She lets the wine merchant puzzle over that. “I am no one’s washerwoman, Mr. Parducci.”
She cannot hide her smile—yes, of pride and triumph—as the wine merchant’s jaw drops. He could not be more surprised at her reprise of her job description if she were a talking dog.
“Happy Columbus Day,” she says, oddly cheered by the man’s discomfort, and signs the wine merchant’s receipt. “Ciao.”
Zhu supervises the wine merchant’s driver as he loads the cases onto the wagon and climbs up next to him on the driver’s seat. The ride is welcome. The afternoon has warmed beneath this beneficent sun. It’s hot and that dreadful dust billows. Zhu holds her handkerchief over her face.
The wagon clatters up to the Parisian Mansion. A conservative brass plaque simply announces the moniker of the place between two simpering but decently clad cupids. Nice. Such plaques have been the subject of much civic dispute. Lucy Mellon, also known as Miss Luce, caused a quite a stir by mounting a brass plaque above her Sacramento Street house announcing, “Ye Olde Whore Shoppe.” The bulls made her take it down.
Zhu sniffs. And a good thing, too. How crude.
The Parisian Mansion’s plaque is the most conservative item of its exterior. Cast plaster cupids smile from every newel, post, archway, portico, and window hood. Jessie calls the paint job Pompeiian red. The elaborate gingerbread is detailed in ivory, eggplant purple, and a startling pale teal. The place is positively hallucinogenic. Zhu can’t quite decide if it’s dreadful or magnificent. Daniel only remarked, “How else does one paint a maison du joi?”
Zhu steps down from the wagon, carelessly swishing her skirts, revealing a flash of her calf, the lace hem of her slip. Although she is swathed in traveling togs, her collar buttoned up tight against her sweaty throat, the driver—a dashing dark-eyed swain with olive skin and masses of black hair—stares, openmouthed. She wears stockings of a pale pink silk. She gets them from Jessie. They’re far more comfortable than the heavy black cotton stockings proper ladies are supposed to wear.
That snippet of pink silk, however, is an unmistakable sign to the driver—homewrecker. A sporting lady, a moll, an owl, a fallen angel, a hooker. A whore.
Suddenly she is fair game.
“Well, well, miss. How much for a whistle?” And he’d been such respectful boy just a moment ago, chatting about the drought.
Zhu ignores his rude question, points to the trademen’s entrance around the side of the Mansion down a well-swept narrow alley. “You may take the cases there.”
“I got time.” He fishes a coin from his shirt pocket. “And I got jack.”
“I don’t have time. Please hurry up.”
He steps in her path, slaps his fist in the palm of his hand. “Who do you think you are, chit? I said I got jack.”
She waves the receipt at him, stamps her foot. “Take the cases in there or I’ll speak to Mr. Parducci about you.” She looks around. “And I’ll call