by Unrivaled
She nodded.
“And you are . . . ?”
“Sir?” For the first time, her quiet confidence seemed to desert her.
“Your name.”
“It’s Jennie, sir.” And she whispered it so quietly I hardly knew if I understood her.
“How long have you worked here?”
“Five years.”
I was just about to speak to her again when a woman walked into the room. She was wearing the kind of dress my sisters had always admired. And her blond hair had been piled on top of her head in a bunch of curls.
I stood.
Jennie, if that really was her name, bobbed her head and left.
The woman smiled at me as she sat at the foot of the table, several places away. “Charles. I must tell you how delighted we are to have you.”
If she was, she was hiding it well. I tried on a smile of my own. “I’m delighted to be here . . . but you’ve got the better of me. I don’t think we’ve met.”
“I’m Augusta.” She said it as if it should mean something.
“It’s nice to meet you, Augusta.” I sat down.
“I’m your stepmother.”
Stepmother? “I hadn’t realized . . .” My father had remarried. I don’t know why it should have surprised me. My parents had divorced long ago. And I’d just watched my mother get married to Andy two days before.
She frowned. “Your father said you hadn’t communicated with each other, but I didn’t really think that . . .” She tipped her head to one side as if considering something. “I should have made further inquiries, but Warren is always so busy. . . .” She sighed. “This must be awkward for you. But what you probably don’t realize is how awkward this is for me too, Charles.”
“Charlie. Please call me Charlie.”
Her frown deepened. “I’m sure Charles will do. In any case, we’re going to have to decide how to explain your presence.”
“How about: My father abandoned his family fifteen years ago, and now he’s decided to make up for lost time?” I picked up a piece of bacon that had been draped across my eggs.
“I don’t think you understand. People are bound to talk. Scandals of this nature—”
“Listen, I don’t have anything against you, Augusta. You seem like a nice lady. But if you’re expecting sympathy, you’ll have to look somewhere else. While you’ve been living here in this—this mansion, I’ve been trying to keep the roof of my house from falling in on top of your husband’s first wife and his daughters. I hope you’ll understand when I say I can’t bring myself to care much about what people will say.”
She looked at me for a long moment, and then she nodded. “I think I do. I’m sorry for the pain he caused you. It wasn’t right. If I’d known about you sooner I would have . . . I would have done something.”
Easy for her to say.
“I hope we can become friends. In the meantime, your father asked me to tell you that he’ll see you as soon as you’ve finished.”
He’d been waiting for me? I used the bacon to push some eggs onto my fork. As I bent to eat them, I looked up from my plate.
She was watching me, brows drawn together. She wasn’t much younger than my mother, and she wasn’t really any prettier. She was just more . . . proper. “We hold a certain position in society, your father and I. We’ve worked very hard to obtain it. It would be most unfortunate if he were driven from it.”
For her, maybe. I stood, folded my napkin, then placed it on the table the way my mother had taught me. “Please excuse me from the table.”
She nodded. “The driver will meet you out front.”
I had the same driver I’d had the day before. I’d been busy staring out the window then, but now I held out my hand as I approached. “Charlie. Thanks for the ride yesterday.”
He glanced up from the crank as if startled, then stood and offered his own. “The name’s Nelson, sir.”
“I’ve never driven a car before. Is it hard?”
“Nothing to it. Just turn the steering wheel the way you want it to go.”
“Better than a horse, then.”
“Now, I didn’t say that!” He patted a head lamp and then, after leaning close to squint at it, pulled the tail of his shirt out, spit onto the brass and gave it a shine. “You still got to feed her and give her a washing off. Polish her up and talk nice to her. She’s got more tack than the boss’s horses ever had. And she’ll throw fits every now and then too.” He tucked his shirttail back in and then took his brass-buttoned coat off and hung it from one of the head lamps. Then he bent to the crank.
“So tell me about this place, Nelson. You been with them long?”
“Since they been here.”
“How long have they been married?”
He gave me a long look over his shoulder before he answered. “’Bout ten years now. But surely you know that.”
I shrugged. “Do they have any children?”
“No, sir.”
“Augusta must not have been very happy to hear about me.”
“The missus? Oh . . . I don’t know about that. More surprised, I’d say, than anything else.”
Once the car sputtered to life, he moved around to open the door for me. I stepped up, ducked inside, and settled into the corner of the tufted bench. I looked at the houses we passed by. All that luxury, all that wealth . . . it should have been my mother’s. And mine. But my father had gone on without us. If he’d remembered us just once, if he’d given us even a tenth of what he’d managed to make since he’d left, so many things might have turned out differently.
Soon the large lawns and houses with towers at their corners gave way to smaller, though still tidy, houses and yards. But then they, too, left off for row houses. Nelson turned to look at me. “We’re headed down to South St. Louis.”
I couldn’t seem to escape my fate. I’d left one South Side only to find myself headed toward another.
“That’s where the factory is. You can see the smokestack just ahead.”
I bent to get a clear view through the front glass, cocking my head, and saw Standard Manufacturing painted in white up the side of a red smokestack.
Nelson stopped the car by the front steps of a large smoke-spewing building. He got out and opened the door for me.
“Ever been inside this place?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Know where I should go?”
“Why, just walk up those front steps and keep on going. Up to the top. That’s where the boss’s office is. I’ll stay right here and wait for you.”
I tipped my hat at him, then walked up the steps and through the door.
My father was sitting in a chair behind a large desk when I was shown into his office. Gleaming wood bookcases lined the walls, and dark patterned rugs carpeted the floor. “Sit down, Charles.”
“It’s Charlie.”
He studied me for a moment. “Charlie’s a boy’s name. But you’re a man now. Charles has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?” He pointed with his cigar toward the chair that sat across from his. “Your mother said you’d gotten yourself into a bit of trouble.”
I sat, resting my ankle on top of my knee, and gripped the arms of the chair. “I wouldn’t call it trouble.” Necessarily.
“Why don’t you tell me about it.”
I might have made the sort of excuses that had satisfied my mother, but something about the look in his eyes warned me from it. So I did something I wasn’t in the habit of doing: I told the truth. “After you left, things got bad.”
He glanced down.
“I worked at what I could. A couple years ago, I got a promotion. To sales.”
He looked up with a grin. “Sales! Like father, like son. Have to say it does me proud to see you carried on the family tradition.”
I ignored him. “But working on the South Side, I had to have connections. So I joined a club.”
His eyes narrowed as he took a puff on his cigar.
“A man got killed,
and I got arrested up for it. By accident. I never hurt anyone, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I’m not worried about some man who’s dead. I’m worried about you.”
It was a little late for that.
“And I have nothing against loyalty. I require it from all of my personal staff. Especially from my personal staff.”
Personal staff?
“You know what I deal in, Charles, don’t you?”
I nodded. Now I did. Seemed like everyone in the country must know.
“I deal in money. Lots of it, just so we’re clear. From what I’ve been told, you used to deal in it too.”
Exactly how much had my mother told him?
“I need someone I can count on because I plan on making quite a bit more. My business isn’t child’s play. I take it very seriously.”
He seemed to expect a reply. “Of course.”
“My wife has no children, and family is important.”
Since when?
“I can’t tell you how happy I am that you’re here.” He sat back in his chair and grinned at me.
I didn’t smile back.
He pulled out a drawer, took a card from it, then pushed it across his desk toward me. I leaned forward and took it.
“That’s the best clothier in town. Go see him. Can’t have my son going around looking like a two-bit salesman. Have Dreffs set you straight and place the charges on my account.”
I could have reacted to that insult, but I decided not to. Deciding not to be offended had saved my life on more than one occasion back on the South Side. And besides, my father couldn’t hurt me any more than he already had.
I found the shop. Dreffs Fine Clothing. But I was wearing my best clothes: my gray checked suit and my fancy blue percale shirt, topped by my one and only hat. I asked for Mr. Dreffs, and a man appeared from behind a curtain a moment later. He took one look and me and then turned as if he were going to go right back to wherever it was that he’d been.
I stepped forward. “Mr. Clarke sent me here. Told me you could set me straight. He said to charge everything to his account.”
He turned back around. “Mr. . . . Stephen Clark?”
“Mr. Warren Clarke.”
His brow lifted at that. “Mr. Warren Clarke of Standard Manufacturing?”
“That’s him.”
The man pursed his lips and then excused himself. I saw him pick up a telephone at the end of a counter. “Standard Manufacturing, please.” He said nothing for a good long while, though he stared at me from across the store the whole time. “Yes. This is Mr. Dreffs of Dreffs Fine Clothing. I’ve a young man here that—yes, of course. It’s just that I have a young man here inquiring about a wardrobe, and he’s insisting that it be charged to Mr. Clarke’s account.” Another pause. “Oh. Yes. I see.” A longer pause. “Of course. Yes, of course. Thank you very much.”
He put the telephone back down, came around from behind the counter, and made a short, smart bow. “I didn’t realize Mr. Clarke had a son in town.”
If St. Louis was anything like Chicago, everyone would soon be realizing it.
“I hope you’ll forgive me . . .”
I smiled and held out my hand. “No hard feelings.”
He shook it. “That’s very gracious of you, sir.” From a drawer he took out a measure. He motioned an assistant forward. “If you will kindly divest yourself of that . . . that.”
I let the assistant help me from my coat. As Dreffs took my measurements, the assistant wrote them down in a little book, as if they were secrets, holding it close to his chest. Dreffs took out a different measure and held it up to my shoulders from several different directions. “Right shoulder one-half inch shorter than the left.”
The assistant scribbled in the book.
“Are you sure? Because I’ve never noticed that before.” Wouldn’t I have noticed something like that?
He addressed me over the rims of his glasses. “And neither did the tailor who made your previous suit.”
“That would be Sears, Roebuck and Company.” I winked at the assistant.
He didn’t even crack a smile.
“There will be no more talk of Sears. Or of Roebuck. They might do fine for the common man, but there is nothing common about Mr. Clarke. And the fact that he sent you here means that you, young man, have just come up in the world.”
He put away his measures, then began to flip through a book of fabric samples.
“You’ll have three sack suits. Single-breasted. Three-button. One in a dark gray worsted, one in a black and gray club check, and one in a worsted twill stripe. One tuxedo-style suit faced with silk. One full dress suit with a swallowtail coat faced with silk. One wool tweed suit for leisure. One long single-breasted overcoat. Two pairs of woolen knickerbockers and two pairs of tweed trousers.” He took in a deep breath. “That should do for autumn and winter. In the spring we’ll have a top coat made in gray, order you some seasonal suits, and ask you to come in for a fitting.” He took another breath before continuing. “He’ll need seven shirts with long bosoms, five plain, two plaited.”
“Could you make me one in blue and another one in red?” I wasn’t counting on wearing fancy clothes all the time.
“I could not.” He kept dictating to the assistant. “He’ll need two pairs of black blucher oxfords, a pair of black patent leather shoes, and a pair of cap toe spat boots.”
“I’ve got some shoes already.”
“Is there anything to recommend them? Like the presence of genuine calf’s leather? Anywhere on them?”
I shrugged.
“He’ll need the shoes. All of them. As well as a pair for playing tennis.”
“I don’t play.”
“You will. Everyone at the club plays.”
I might have told him I wasn’t a member of any club here in this city, but he hadn’t listened to me yet, and I doubted he would start anytime soon.
He took some belts and suspenders from beneath the counter top and had me try on some hats. He handed my already-tied teck tie to his assistant and then addressed himself to me. “There will be no more teck ties. From now on, you will wear neckties. A refined gentleman always ties his own knot.” He pulled an assortment of neckties and pocket squares from a case and had the assistant wrap them up. He chose a silk top hat, two homburgs, and a flat cap. Then he disappeared into a back room, returning with a suit that he handed to me. “It won’t fit perfectly, but at least it will do until I can get the others made. If you change in there—” he gestured toward a curtain that had been drawn across the back corner of the room— “I’ll take care of your old one.” He had already taken my rubber collar and my derby and thrown them into a trash bin. “I’ll have the rest of the items delivered to Mr. Clarke’s residence.”
It took a moment in that dressing room, as I looked into the mirror, to get used to myself. The person looking at me wasn’t the old Charlie Clarke of Chicago’s South Side. And it wasn’t the new Charlie from the train either. In the mirror, staring back at me, was a man. Old Charlie was gone forever; all his rough edges had been rubbed off. In his place was a quite proper and rather stuffy-looking Charles.
Dreffs pushed aside the curtain and gave me a look-over. “Excellent. Now, I am going to tell you something that I expect you to remember.” He tapped at each of my coat’s buttons with his finger. “Always. Sometimes. Never.”
Always, sometimes, never . . . what?
“You must always button the top button of your coats. You may sometimes choose to button the middle buttons, but you must never, under any circumstances, button the bottom one.”
Well, then why was the fool thing there in the first place?
Mr. Dreffs added socks and handkerchiefs and several caps. He instructed me on what to wear to work, to the opera, to a dinner party, and to golf outings.
I hoped he didn’t expect me to remember.
He also chose three sweaters with a rolled neck style that I had always publicly
scorned but secretly admired. “You’re to wear these with a pair of tweed trousers or knickerbockers. Never underneath a suit. And never with worsted.” He leveled a look at me over his glasses and then commanded me to repeat all of his advice. Next, he selected a plain though heavy pocket watch and three pairs of gloves.
An hour later, I was walking down Olive Street feeling as if St. Louis was paradise itself. Where else could a man be given a chance at a new life? I’d left Manny White and the past behind. I might have to work for my father, but that was all right. He owed me. And once I was able to put some money aside, once I figured we were even, then I planned to walk away. Just once, I wanted to leave him the same way he’d left me.
5
“Oh!” My handbag slipped from my wrist as I walked right into a man on Olive Street. The wide brim of my new mushroom-style hat had hidden him from my view.
His hand at my elbow was the only thing that kept me from falling.
“I am so sorry!” I looked up into the most delicious eyes I’d ever seen. They were like pools of the best milk chocolate . . . with caramel swirls at their center.
He lifted his hat. “A girl as pretty as you could never be at fault.” He flashed a dimpled smile as he stooped to pick up my handbag.
“I—”
“Lucy?” My aunt had continued on down the sidewalk without me, but now she was turning back. “Lucy?”
As I took the handbag from him, I smiled my thanks. Looking up into his eyes, there was something about the man that seemed familiar. I hadn’t met him before, had I? Surely I would have remembered. I could never have forgotten those dimples or his eyes. I felt a blush warm my cheeks.
“May I help you?” My aunt stood before us, glowering, as if she were shooing away street urchins at the ancient forum in Rome.
The man retreated. “No. I’m sorry. I was just—”
I slipped my handbag back over my wrist, then put a hand to my aunt’s arm. “He was kind enough to help me after I walked into him. It was all my fault.”
He was already walking away.