The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress

by Ariel Lawhon

Stella chose her words carefully. “Does he come in alone?”

  “I don’t see them come in, Mrs. Crater. My job is to watch what they do while they’re here.”

  “What about when he left? Was he alone then?”

  Stan shook his head. “No good’s gonna come of you being here.”

  “If you won’t tell me what I need to know, then I’ll talk to your boss.”

  “You’re a pretty lady. And you seem smart. But this”—he motioned around the room—“is not the place for you. Owney don’t cater to your type. The only things you’ll learn here will lead to heartbreak.”

  “You think I don’t know about heartbreak?”

  “There’s a lot of things you don’t know.” He looked at the clock. “The first of which is that in about fifteen minutes this place is going to get rowdy. The dancing girls have let out. I doubt you have the stomach for that.”

  “I’m not a prude.”

  “Go home, Mrs. Crater.”

  “Where’s Owney Madden?”

  Stan took his dish towel and began to dry a set of lowball glasses. His eyes were warm and brown, and he looked uneasy. “See that guy back there in the corner booth?”

  She looked to her left. A large booth sat on a riser, tucked into the corner. Its occupant was an arrogant-looking man with flinty eyes and a scar on his upper lip. “Yes.”

  “That’s Owney. When Joe comes in, it’s to talk to him. That’s all I know.”

  “I’d bet you know what my husband has to drink when he comes in here.”

  Stan didn’t answer.

  “He doesn’t drink tap water. I know that much.”

  He slid the whiskey bottle across the bar. “This,” he said. “On the rocks.”

  “Pour me one of those, if you don’t mind. Just the way Joe takes it.”

  “This is stout liquor, Mrs. Crater.”

  Stella set her elbows on the bar and leaned forward a few inches. Her smile was firm and cold. “Who the hell do you think taught me to drink?”

  He dropped six ice cubes into the glass and covered them with whiskey. Slid it across the bar. Stella took her drink and walked toward the corner booth, where Owney Madden sat alone. She didn’t turn around when Stan called her name, a clear note of warning in his voice. Poor kid. She’d leave him out of this.

  Owney didn’t notice Stella until she was a few feet away. He sat up a little straighter when she stopped in front of his booth and set her glass on the table.

  “Mind if I join you?” she asked.

  “Looks as though you’ve a mind to do just that.”

  Stella forced the amused look from her face. Such a ridiculous accent, Scouse. Lewks as though yeh’ve a meend to do just thaht. None of the dignity of the English or the passion of the Irish. Truly a stew of dialects, just as the name implied. Scouse: named for the lamb soup so favored by the citizens of Liverpool and Merseyside.

  She smiled. “I won’t intrude where I’m not wanted.”

  Owney spread his arm out. “Be my guest.”

  She stepped onto the riser and scooted across the seat until she was opposite him. She set her purse in her lap. “You’re not drinking tonight?”

  “I never drink while I’m working, Miss …?”

  “Mrs. Crater.”

  “Ah,” he said. “Joe’s wife.”

  “I assume you know why I’m here?”

  Owney laughed. “Don’t start assuming anything. We don’t know each other.”

  Stella wrapped her fingers around the glass. The condensation soaked through her gloves, and she steadied herself. “You got my message?”

  “Contrary to popular opinion, I do not have a secretary. Only a pubescent bartender who is highly unreliable when it comes to communicating details about the opposite sex.” Owney plucked a cigarette from an open pack on the table. He propped it between crooked front teeth and struck a match. After he’d taken a long drag, he asked, “This message you left, was it important?”

  “Do I look like the kind of woman who would be in a place like this otherwise?” Stella took a sip of her whiskey. She cupped it in her tongue, controlling every drop as it slid down her throat to avoid the cough that threatened to roar through her body. She took another sip.

  “No, you do not. Liquor aside.”

  “Joe was a friend of yours?”

  “I’d call him a customer.”

  “Your customer has gone missing, Mr. Madden.”

  Owney blew smoke out his nose. It clouded in front of his face and then drifted toward the ceiling. “So they say. But I don’t see what you want me to do about it.”

  “Joe’s gone. So I want you to return the deed to my lake house.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Sure you do. During Joe’s campaign to get on the court, he sold a number of properties to raise funds. But the deed to the lake house is in my name. Not his. Something he failed to recall when he sold it to you. And I want it back.”

  Owney dropped his air of nonchalance, eyes tightening around the corners. “And what do I get in exchange?”

  Stella undid the clasp on her purse and pulled out the business card she’d found in Joe’s coat pocket. She placed it faceup on the table. “You get this. And a promise that I won’t tell the police that you were the person who insisted my husband come back from Maine.”

  STELLA made it back to her apartment well after one in the morning. She stepped from the elevator and saw an older woman by the door. She glanced up as Stella approached.

  “Where have you been?” the woman demanded, all nerves and sympathy.

  “Honestly, Mother.” Stella dug for the keys in her purse.

  “A hello would be appreciated. Especially under the circumstances. I had to take the night train.” Emma Wheeler had taken up sentry outside the apartment, sitting on her suitcase, a small purse clasped in her hands. Legs crossed and spine plumb-line straight.

  Looks like she swallowed a walking stick in one gulp, Joe often said, marveling at her mother’s posture. It made Emma look severe and uncompromising.

  “You could have let me know you were coming.”

  “I called from the train station. Five times.”

  Stella reached out a hand and helped her mother to her feet. “I was out.”

  Emma wrinkled her nose. “Have you been drinking?”

  “Only to prove a point.”

  “I raised you better than that. Women of decent reputation do not drink.”

  “Neither do they have missing husbands. Yet here I am, liquored up and fully abandoned. Now, would you like to come inside, or would you rather lecture me in the hall?”

  “I’ve been waiting here”—she looked at her watch—“three hours.”

  Stella swallowed her retort and unlocked the door. She held it open. Emma swept into the entry, keen eyes searching for a point of criticism on which to land. She left her suitcase in the hallway for Stella to fetch. From the weight of it, she guessed her mother had packed half her wardrobe.

  “I am your mother. It is my duty to comfort you in times like this.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Your sister called. Said you’d come back to the city to look for Joe. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  She lied. “I didn’t want to worry you.” In reality, she hadn’t wanted her mother to interfere.

  After Stella set Emma’s suitcase in the hall closet, she found her in the living room, running one finger along the bookcase. She inspected the tip of her glove. “You ought to fire your maid.”

  “Maria does fine work. Stop criticizing.” A single lamp was on in the living room, and Stella switched the others on to lighten the room.

  “What are you doing?” her mother asked.

  “I’ll be up for a while. I have some calls to make.”

  “But it’s almost two in the morning.”

  “I can’t sleep.”

  “Don’t you think it would be wiser to go to bed? You’ve been out half the n
ight.” Emma peeled her gloves off, one finger at a time, and lifted her hat from her carefully set hair. “Doing God knows what.”

  “I was taking care of business. Why don’t you go to bed?”

  “You’d think a grown man would know how to look after himself.”

  “Mother!” The word was sharp, and Stella winced at the sound of her own voice. Her next words were kinder, though unwavering. “Did you come to help or chastise?”

  Emma stared at her daughter, face turning to granite. They shared the same startling blue eyes and propensity for saying exactly what they thought. Mother and daughter regarded each other, unsure of the protocol in this situation.

  Stella asserted herself. It was her home, after all. Her missing husband. And she’d not asked her mother to come. “I would drink some coffee if you made it.”

  Emma did not look up as she made her way to the kitchen, but Stella heard her mutter, “This trauma has addled her senses.”

  When Emma was out of earshot, Stella pulled a slim white envelope from her purse and retreated to Joe’s office. She knelt in front of the bookshelf behind his desk and pushed against the lower panel. It swung outward to reveal a small safe built into the wall. She fumbled her way through the combination three times before getting it right. The door opened with a click, and she set the deed to the lake house inside.

  Chapter Eleven

  ORCHARD STREET, LOWER EAST SIDE, SUNDAY, AUGUST 31, 1930

  JUDE hadn’t moved from a supine position by the time Maria finished dressing for Mass. She brushed a knot of tangled hair away from his forehead and kissed his temple. He lay stretched across the bed, arms and legs askew, and she stood back to look at his half-naked body. The sheet was wrapped around his waist, his head beneath one arm. Maria ran her finger over his parted lips, feeling the warmth of his breath and then the stubble on his chin. Any other day she would have crawled back into bed and made love to him. Instead, she left a note—Gone to Mass, be back soon—and slipped out the door.

  The sun had scarcely risen over Midtown as Maria walked toward the spired Gothic beast that was St. Patrick’s Cathedral. She had given up her dream of a wedding there when she married Jude, but she still adored every marbled, gilded inch of the place. It was the church of her childhood: confirmation, confession, First Communion. Her father had insisted they attend the elaborate cathedral instead of their smaller, humbler parish in Queens. In time, she learned that his decision had less to do with piety and more to do with business. The wealthy went to St. Patrick’s. Maria’s father secured a job as a tailor at Smithson’s within six months of their first Mass. Irreverent as it seemed, Maria could never argue the wisdom of his decision. The church had been kind to them. It was the place where she first understood that prayers were holy and that God wasn’t some other thing out there, but the most important thing anywhere.

  She tugged on one of the ornate handles attached to the double doors and stepped inside. Mass would not start for an hour. The sanctuary was filled with silence and splashes of indigo light from the sun filtering through a stained-glass kaleidoscope above the altar. She kept to the shadows and slid into a wooden pew at the back of the church to wait.

  The confessionals on each side of the nave were discreetly tucked behind towering marble columns. None of them were occupied. The repentant had not yet risen, apparently. Except for Maria. And she made no move toward the red-velvet-draped booths. Instead, she watched a handful of parishioners light candles at the side altars and kneel, whispering over clasped hands, filling the church with the scent of prayer: incense and candle smoke. Some settled into the pews. Others tiptoed from St. Patrick’s, their business with God tended for now.

  After several minutes, a small door creaked open inside the chancel and a weathered priest limped out. Maria relaxed in her seat. She watched him shuffle toward the altar and down three steps into the sanctuary. She was struck by his ruined body, how he took a step and then lifted his other leg, dragging a crooked foot along the floor—a dilapidated man in vestments. The priest lowered himself into the front pew and sat with his back to her, head bowed in reverence.

  Maria took a quick breath through her nose. The scent of wood polish, floor wax, and the cracked leather of old Bibles gave her the courage she needed to rise and walk down the nave toward the confessional nearest the waiting priest. She cleared her throat as she slipped behind the red curtain and drew it shut.

  The booth was small and oddly comforting. She sat, back straight and eyes on the cloth-covered ceiling. After several moments, there was a rustle of fabric on the other side of the screen partition. The click of wooden rosary beads knocking against one another. A whispered prayer in Latin. Then silence—her invitation to begin.

  “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned,” she said, her words drifting away as it occurred to her that she did not know how to say what she’d come to confess.

  More silence.

  “It’s been many months since my last confession.” Maria wiped her sweaty palms across the fabric of her dress. “I don’t know how long.”

  A melancholy sigh, and then the partition slid back.

  Startled, Maria looked at the priest and saw the familiar face with its kind gray eyes and tender smile. She smiled. “Hello, Father Donnegal.”

  “Maria.”

  She looked at the wedge of partition tucked into the wall between them. “This is …”

  “One friend speaking to another.”

  Finn Donnegal had taken the cloth five years before Maria was born, when her parents were still newlyweds living in Barcelona. He’d always been a staple in her life. Family friend. Counselor. Adopted uncle. He had secretly defied her parents to attend her wedding to Jude at City Hall—his support for their union stopping short only at performing the ceremony himself. She hadn’t had the heart to ask.

  “I came here to confess,” she said.

  “Did you, now?” A skeptical twitch of his eyebrow.

  Maria opened her mouth and then snapped it shut again, abashed. She sank farther into the seat. “I’ve done something I shouldn’t have.”

  Father Donnegal leaned back against the wall, allowing space for her confession. A note of doubt laced his voice. He would always believe her to be a wide-eyed innocent. “What have you done?”

  When Maria could see just the edge of his profile, she said, “I stole money from my employer.” It was more than that, of course, but the story was not entirely hers to share.

  She was absurdly pleased to hear the surprise in his voice.

  “Why?”

  A complicated answer. She sighed. Maria wanted to tell him about that day in the apartment and about Jude and the envelopes. Her raging curiosity. Yet she’d come that morning to hear secrets, not to tell them, so she offered only a thin slice of the truth.

  “Mr. Crater is missing,” she said. “A reporter came to his home while I was cleaning and told me. And I thought … I don’t know … that there might not be any more paychecks. The last one is three weeks late already.”

  “Many of God’s children have been tempted by less.”

  “But I don’t do that kind of thing.”

  “Apparently, you do.” Finn clasped the gold crucifix that hung around his neck. “Does he know what you have done?”

  “No.”

  “Do you still have the money?”

  “Yes.”

  The booth settled into a solemn hush. Finn seemed perfectly comfortable in the silence, but Maria squirmed beneath its weight. “What is my penance?”

  “You must return the money.”

  “Should I tell him what I’ve done?”

  Finn tipped his head to one side. “Do you know the difficult thing about God, Maria?”

  At the moment, everything about God seemed difficult. “There’s just one thing?”

  “He can only deal with the truth.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means the truth is more important than protecting yourself. Regardl
ess of the consequences.”

  Maria groaned. “I will lose my job.”

  “Perhaps.”

  Never one to rush the repentant, he waited while she considered that possibility. Only when she shifted her weight and sighed again did he say, “This is the first time you’ve ever come to me for confession. Why now?”

  “It’s awkward. You’re practically family. It’s like a brother reading your diary.”

  Father Donnegal pressed her with silence.

  “You’re the one I need to speak with,” she finally said.

  “Why?”

  Maria wanted to give a different answer, but she couldn’t lie to him. “Jude came to see you a few weeks ago.”

  “So now we get to the truth of your visit.”

  “I’m not here under false pretenses.” Not completely, at any rate. She had wanted to confess her theft.

  His face settled into a look of patient disbelief.

  “He told me that he came,” Maria continued. She played with her purse strap, coiling it around her fingers, wishing for her rosary and suppressing a sudden rage at Jude. She wouldn’t be here if not for him. “I was hoping you’d tell me what the two of you spoke about.”

  “You know I can’t do that.” Finn gripped the edge of the partition with knobby, arthritic fingers and slid it shut. “Not even for you.”

  She winced. “But—”

  “Let us pray.”

  Maria leaned forward, straining to hear his quiet absolution. She cleared her throat, ashamed. “Amen.”

  “Give thanks to the Lord,” he added.

  “For his mercies endure forever,” she answered in a whisper. Maria pushed back the curtain and hurried from the church. The heat of embarrassment was still bright on her cheeks as she fled St. Patrick’s.

  GRAND STREET, LOWER EAST SIDE,

  WEDNESDAY, MARCH 5, 1930

  Maria laughed. “Careful, that’s the curb.”

  She wrapped Jude’s arm around her shoulders and dragged him back onto the sidewalk. He struggled to find his balance, as though it were the ground that spun.

  “I’m drunk.”

  “No,” she said, “you were drunk hours ago. Now you’re outright pickled.”