felt bad, bringing this stench into his sweet-smelling, comfortable home. She crossed her arms and winced as he jogged upstairs, as if that could contain the odor. He was back in minutes, with two dresses across his arm. “One of these should fit.”
She looked up at him. “You have dresses?”
“They were my wife’s.”
She blinked.
“Hand me your clothes out and I’ll douse them in vinegar. That’ll help. When you take them home get Annie to put some baking soda into the washtub with the soap. Oh, and there’s a clean washcloth on the stand.”
She turned and he gestured toward a bathroom, which she entered. She stripped down, pushed her clothes out through a gap in the door, then washed her face and hands, scrubbing at her skin with the washcloth and lye soap. The acrid smell refused to dissipate; in the confines of the warm little room, it almost made her gag and she scrubbed as hard as she could without actually removing a layer of skin. As an afterthought she poured a jug of water over her head, rubbing at her hair with soap and rinsing it, then rough drying it with a towel. Finally she slipped into the green dress. It was what her mother would have called a tea-dress, short-sleeved and floral with a white lace collar, a little loose around the waist, but at least it smelled clean. There was a bottle of scent on top of a cabinet. She sniffed it, then sprayed a little on her wet hair.
She emerged some minutes later to find Fred standing by the window looking down at the illuminated town square. He turned, his mind clearly lost elsewhere, and perhaps because of his wife’s dress, he seemed suddenly shaken. He recovered himself swiftly and handed her a glass of iced tea. “Thought you might need this.”
“Thank you, Mr. Guisler.” She took a sip. “I feel rather silly.”
“Fred. Please. And don’t feel bad. Not for a minute. We’ve all been caught.”
She stood for a moment, feeling suddenly awkward. She was in a strange man’s home, wearing his dead wife’s dress. She didn’t know what to do with her limbs. A roar went up somewhere in town and she winced. “Oh, goodness. I haven’t just made your lovely house smell awful but you’ve missed Tex Lafayette. I’m so sorry.”
He shook his head. “It’s nothing. I couldn’t leave you, looking so . . .”
“Skunks, eh!” she said brightly, and his concerned expression didn’t shift, as if he knew that the smell was not the thing that had so upset her.
“Still! You can probably catch the rest of it if we head back now,” she said. She had started to gabble. “I mean, it looks like he’ll be singing a while. You were quite right. He’s very good. Not that I heard a huge amount, what with one thing and another, but I can see why he’s so popular. The crowd does seem to love him.”
“Alice—”
“Goodness. Look at the time. I’d better head back.” She walked past him toward the door, her head down. “You should absolutely head back to the show. I’ll walk home. It’s no distance.”
“I’ll drive you.”
“In case of more skunks?” Her laugh was high and brittle. Her voice didn’t even sound like her own. “Honestly, Mr. Guisler—Fred—you’ve been so very kind already and I don’t want to put you to more trouble. Really. I don’t—”
“I’ll take you,” he said firmly. He took his jacket from the back of a chair, then removed a small blanket from another and placed it around her shoulders. “It’s turned chilly out there.”
They stepped onto the porch. Alice was suddenly acutely aware of Frederick Guisler, of the way he had of observing her, as if looking through whatever she said or did to assess its true purpose. It was oddly discomfiting. She half stumbled down the porch steps and he reached out a hand to steady her. She clutched at it, then immediately let go as if she’d been stung.
Please don’t say anything else, she said silently. Her cheeks were aflame again, her thoughts a jumble. But when she glanced up he wasn’t looking at her.
“Was that door like that when we came in?” He was staring at the back of the library. The door, which had been open a sliver to allow in the sound of the music, was now wide open. A series of distant, irregular thumps came from within. He stood very still, then turned to Alice, his ease of the previous