by Kirby Larson
The second message was from Mrs. Holm wondering if I had Ruby’s mother’s telephone number. She had a question for Ruby about a recent transaction. I rang right back and told her I only had a mailing address. Long-distance calls were out of my budget. “Oh, of course,” Mrs. Holm said. “I’m so sorry to have bothered you.”
Charlie met me in the lobby, armed with copies of the paper he’d collected from all the pilots at the airfield. “For your scrapbook,” he said.
“For Dora Dean’s scrapbook,” I corrected. But I was still pleased at the thought. And pleased to have someone like Charlie to share my good news.
He set his cap on the front desk in the lobby. “Mr. Hubbard gets all the credit for his fancy flights, but I know I’m part of the reason he’s up in the air,” he said. “ ‘Not for glory, but for the job well done,’ ” he added dramatically, quoting our old teacher, Miss Simpson.
I whacked him with one of the newspapers.
“Ow!” He rubbed his head. “Maybe I should reconsider that offer of supper.”
“It’d take more than a clop with the Chronicle to harm that hard head of yours.” I shuffled the papers he’d given me into a manageable bundle. “Let me run these upstairs. I’m famished.”
Charlie plopped his cap back on his head. “I’ll wait right here.”
I hurried up to my room and dropped off the papers. A quick glance in the mirror afforded a pleasant surprise: the girl there looked like she was on her way somewhere. Somewhere besides a cleaning woman’s job. She looked like she had another good story or two in her. I smiled at the thought. A story or two and maybe even a real job at the paper. I let myself enjoy that notion for a minute, then locked up and rode the elevator down to meet Charlie.
Supper flew by in a barrage of Charlie stories. As tired as I was, I kept him talking. I was like a squirrel, storing up his voice for the coming winter. When the last of our sandwiches were devoured—minced olive for me, a club for him—I stifled a yawn.
“I guess I’m boring you,” he teased.
“Never.” Another yawned threatened. “But I didn’t get a nap in today.” I made a motion as if dusting a shelf. “One of the many necessities of working the night shift if I change my schedule.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” He stood, then came around to pull out my chair. “I didn’t even think about that.”
“I’ll live,” I assured him. “I’ll catch up on my beauty sleep tomorrow.”
He offered me his arm and I took it, and we stepped out onto the sidewalk. “Let’s head this way,” I said. “I have an errand.”
Charlie stopped and made a fearful face. “Not at a hat shop?” he asked. “Or some such?”
“Rest easy.” I rolled my eyes at him. “I wouldn’t make you suffer through something like that.” Nor would I want to suffer through shopping of any kind with Charlie moping behind me.
“I’m going to mail a copy of your article back home, to Mother and Dad,” Charlie said. “They’ll be so proud of you.”
“Well, don’t make too big a fuss,” I said. “It might be a fluke.”
He guided me around a grandmother pushing a pram. “I think that Miss Marjorie D’Lacorte needs to take care that Miss Hattie Brooks doesn’t pass her right on by.”
I shook my head. “She has no reason to fret.” I shivered a bit. The evening breeze carried a touch of fall’s cool air in it. My jacket might get me through autumn, but after that, I’d need something warmer. And the cheapest winter coat at Praeger’s would be well out of my price range after I wired Ruby the money for Pearl’s specialist. I crossed my fingers for some more research assignments. “Even if I got a job at the paper, it’d be on the fashion desk or society news. I wouldn’t be a real reporter.”
“Wasn’t it Lincoln who said ‘Whatever you are, be a good one’?” Charlie patted my hand. “You’d hit a home run no matter which job you were given.”
“Spoken like a true friend,” I said lightly. A hank of his dark hair had fallen over his forehead. I brushed it back. “You need a haircut,” I teased.
He caught my hand. “What I really need is to know if what you want is here in San Francisco.”
I pulled away. It seemed Charlie and I had just figured out how to be easy with one another again, and now this. “Let’s not talk about this now. Here.”
“I want to.” He stopped under the Owl Drug awning. “I’m tired of not talking about it.”
Something in his voice made me stop, too. “I’m not ready—”
“I know. I know.” He exhaled deeply. “That I can live with. But what I can’t live with is wondering if you’ll ever be ready. For me, that is.”
It was a fair question. What was the answer?
He didn’t wait for me to say anything. “You know I’d be the last person to keep you from doing what you want.”
“I do know that.”
He reached out and took my hands in his. “What about the papers in Seattle?” he asked. “Couldn’t you try to get a job at one of those?”
Another fair question. “Yes. And no.” I stepped closer to him. Bad mistake. His eyes had too much power at this range. Not letting go of his warm, strong hands, I rocked back on my heels, away from those eyes. “I could try, certainly. But it’d be like planting a whole new field, from scratch.” I paused, thinking about what to say next. “Here, it’s like I’ve already picked the rocks and done the plowing. Now all I have to do is buy the seed.”
He edged closer. A matronly woman clucked her tongue at us. “Really,” she said, the word dripping with disapproval. We walked a few more feet, then turned down a street with fewer passersby.
“What about Chase and the little girls? Fern and Lottie?” he asked. “They all miss you like crazy.”
I slowed my pace for a moment. “I miss them, too.” That was the truth. Little Lottie wouldn’t even know me by the time I got to see her. “It’s not that I don’t love them or want to be with them.…”
He stopped to face me, placing his hands on my coat sleeves. “It’s me that you don’t want to be with.” His voice was soft. Sad. Maybe even resigned.
“Everything’s all jumbled in my head.” I blinked back tears. “It’s like I’ve got all these quilt pieces—Perilee and the kids, Seattle, the newspaper. And I can hardly leave Ruby now, not with Pearl so sick and all.”
“Am I even one of the quilt pieces?”
I swiped at my eyes. A life without Charlie? It was impossible to imagine. “Yes. You are certainly an important piece of my life.”
“Well, that’s a comfort,” he said with a head shake. “Look, I saw that guy with Miss D’Lacorte. He’s a reporter, too, right? Is that my competition?”
“Ned?” Ned was barely speaking to me. “No. No.” How could I explain things to Charlie when I wasn’t even sure myself? “Looking back, I’d have to agree with Aunt Ivy that I was a fool to think I could prove up on Uncle Chester’s homestead. I’d never farmed and didn’t have one idea about what that big prairie could be like.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Charlie said. “Lots of men went bust out there, too.”
“That’s just it.” His words helped jell my thoughts. “I was hard on myself. At first. For failing.” We started walking again. “Did you know that Thomas Edison made thousands of mistakes before he got the lightbulb right?”
“Thomas Edison?” Charlie wrinkled his brow.
“Yes, and even that Ty Cobb strikes out, sometimes, too, doesn’t he?”
He shook his head. “This sounds like one of those try, try, and try again lectures Miss Simpson used to give.”
“Not exactly.” Why was it I could hear the explanation so clearly in my mind but the words were coming out all knotted up like tangled thread? “It’s sort of about not giving up. But more, it’s about giving yourself—giving myself the chance to see what I’m really made of.” I thought back to the emptiness I’d first felt after leaving Vida. That feeling that something was unfinished. That I was unfin
ished. “It probably makes no sense to you, but I don’t think I’ll be able to know what I can really do with my life unless I stick it out.”
He didn’t say anything for about a half a block. “And your only shot is here?”
His question pricked like a darning needle. “It is for now.”
We slowly crossed the street, as if each of us were carrying a steamer trunk on our backs. Or in our hearts. “Oh, here’s Western Union.” I unclasped my pocketbook and brought out my wallet.
“You need to wire money?” He reached out to open the office door for me.
“To Ruby. Pearl needs a specialist.”
“But you told me you already gave her some money.” He stood so that he blocked my entry. “Doesn’t seem right, her asking again.”
“Charlie!” I tapped him to make him step aside. “A little girl needs my help.” I hadn’t been able to help Mattie. There was no way I’d let Pearl down.
“Okay. Okay.” He brushed that rebellious hank of hair off his forehead. “I better be getting back. We’re leaving in the morning.”
“Back to Seattle?” My heart felt as if it’d been put in an icebox. “So soon?”
He turned up his hands. “Seems like there’s not much reason to stick around.”
“Charlie—”
“You know I wish the best for you. But I may have to start thinking about what’s best for me. I’m sure you can understand that.”
I wanted to say, “But what does that mean, the best for you?” I wanted to say, “I’ll look for a job in Seattle.” I wanted to say, “Don’t leave now.” But all of that stayed locked up inside. Instead I said, “It was so very good to see you, Charlie. Thank you for the meals and for—for everything. Good-bye.” I held out my hand to shake.
He clasped it, stepping close. I thought he was going to kiss me again, right there in front of Western Union! Would I be able to say good-bye if he did? Seconds passed.
There was no kiss. He released my hand, strode down the steps to the sidewalk, and, with that cap of his, was soon folded into the crowd of other workingmen in their matching caps and I could not see which way he went.
“Are you going inside?” a woman on the steps behind me asked.
“Oh, yes. Pardon me.” I stepped into the lobby, my shoes making a lonely scuffing sound as I walked to the nearest operator window.
Shaken to the Core
September 4, 1919
Dear Ruby,
Oh, what a blessing that the new medicine seems to be helping Pearl. You must be so relieved. It will be good to see you whenever you return. And the thought that you might be able to bring Pearl with you makes this absence from you easier to bear.
The person you asked about is a frequent supper guest at Perilee’s, she informs me. I do not hear from him myself. Until I do, I feel the only honorable thing is for me not to write him, either.
Ned has taken a keener interest in my work. He makes a carbon copy of one of his articles each day and tasks me to be his copy reader. This is a better writing education than anything Miss Simpson devised. Allow me to crow a bit and tell you that he used one of my phrasings just the other day—“Pinkerton detectives are in the pink in phony ruby scheme.” It gave me quite the thrill to see that silly sentence in print. As much as I enjoy Bernice and Spot, I do long for the day I trade in my navy blue smock for a (working!) typewriter.
If there is anything I can do for you here, please let me know.
Yours,
Hattie
The latest from Ruby sounded like she would be back in town in a few weeks and Pearl would arrive in October, which would make a wonderful early birthday present for me. But it also meant I needed to hurry up and finish Pearl’s quilt. I took it to work to stitch on during my lunch hour.
“What’s that you’re working on?” Spot asked. “It’s so cheery.”
“It’s for Ruby’s daughter, Pearl.” I spread the quilt top out so Spot could see the whole thing. “But I’ve got to get busy. Sounds like she’ll be here soon.”
“Grandmother’s Fan,” Bernice observed, looking at the pattern. “Have you extra needles?”
And that was the beginning of our wee-hours quilting bee. Spot was enthusiastic but a bit uneven. For someone so solid, Bernice took the tiniest stitches. With a needle in hand, she became another person and nearly talked circles around Spot each night as we sewed.
Because of the quilting project, the only time spent in the morgue was for other people’s projects. Though Ned had helped as much as he could, I was still straddling two worlds—that of charwoman and reporter hopeful. I was weary of my late-night sweeping and scouring and ready to take on the mantle of cub reporter. But my aerial story had not been enough to convince Mr. Monson; I needed something even more dramatic or I would never be able to plant my feet firmly under a newsroom desk. I must be as bold as an eagle or be resigned to the life of a crow, hopping after the bits and crumbs left by others. One night, I decided to forgo a few hours’ sleep and head straight to the morgue instead of home to my bed after work.
Fighting against scratchy eyelids, I pulled down yet another bound journal of back issues and began to read. The columns of newsprint blurred together. I found myself nodding off. This would not do! I pinched my cheeks to wake myself up and marched back and forth along the floor, swinging my arms vigorously to get the blood flowing. After several minutes of these gymnastics, I took my seat again and picked up where I left off.
Another hour passed. Another round of marching and arm-swinging. I was generally a hopeful person, but it seemed to me I had taken on a task that made setting fence posts in the frozen prairie seem simple. These pages and pages and pages of newsprint were filled with names and dates and events. Here was a report about Harry Houdini’s famous escape from a straitjacket; there an article recounting the progress made so far on the new Lincoln Memorial, in Washington, D.C; the sinking of the Lusitania; Babe Ruth’s first home run. Why did I think that in this enormous tangle of human doings, I would find out anything else about Uncle Chester, let alone anything newsworthy?
I slammed the big volume shut and lugged it over to the bookcase. As I began to slide it back in its proper spot, I noticed I’d accidentally folded in a corner of a section of pages. Balancing the heavy book on my left hand, I flipped it open to smooth out the bent sheets. My fingers passed over a headline in the right-hand column, near the bottom of the page: “Bank Is Victim of $4,550 Forgery.” From under the headline, Uncle Chester’s name leaped out. “Chester Hubert Wright is accused of attempting to cash a forged bank draft, drawn on the National Park Bank of New York and in the amount of $4,550. Wright claimed the check was given him by a friend.”
My arms could no longer hold the book. I set it on the library table, reading the horrible article through several more times. When Uncle Chester had called himself a scoundrel in his only letter to me, I’d believed it a bit of poetic license. My throat tightened to think that the same person who had given me a chance at a life of my own was nothing more than a thief. And not a very good one, either, or he would not have gotten caught.
I returned the heavy leather volume to the shelf, then sat in the dark for a good long while, batting at my discovery as a cat might a ball of yarn. Like me, Uncle Chester had been orphaned at a young age, out on his own before most boys are out of short pants. It wasn’t impossible to imagine him falling in with the wrong crowd and embracing a life outside of respectable society. But that seemed something out of a Horatio Alger novel, too pat to be true. My uncle had filled his claim shack with books—was that the action of a thief? And he was held in such high regard back in Vida! Perilee, who had no tolerance for the slick and sinful, had nothing but good to say about him. How could he have fooled her? Or Leafie? Or Rooster Jim?
Speaking of fools, I had proved myself one, once again, with a silly idea that a story about my uncle might be my ticket to a press card. I hadn’t thought it through, hadn’t thought about the consequences should I learn,
as I had, that Uncle Chester deserved that scoundrel label. My investigating had provided a powerful lesson: truth can both lift up and knock down. With one blow, the truth about my uncle had destroyed two dreams. I had no stomach for learning anything more about his life. I would close up Pandora’s box as tightly as I could, even if that meant I might never find the story that would admit me to the rank of reporter. Why did I keep hitching myself to dreams as big as that Montana sky? I was like Rooster Jim’s chickens, with no way to fly that high.
I trudged up to the lobby. Ned was coming in as I was going out; he called a greeting to me but I walked on as if I hadn’t heard. I feared that if I opened my mouth, even to say hello to someone, Uncle Chester’s story would come spilling out. I needed some time alone to mull over what to think, what to feel.
There had been someone I could confide in, someone who would understand. Charlie. But by staying here, I’d built a fence between us that might never find its gate. As I walked, the pain of that choice throbbed like a sore tooth. Every few steps, I’d poke at it to see if it still hurt. It did.
Uncle Chester had set me off balance inside, but something was off balance outside, too. It wasn’t until I came upon a feather that I realized what was wrong, and scanned the sky. Generally, the gulls could make themselves heard over any traffic noises. But I heard no maaw-maaw-maaws. Odder yet, I didn’t see any gulls above. Still, I picked up the feather for my growing collection. Maude had teased that soon I’d have enough for wings of my own.
Admiring a pyramid of oranges on display at the corner grocer, I missed my step and stumbled. I fought to keep my feet under me, realizing I hadn’t stumbled—the sidewalk was bucking like a cranky range horse.
Juggling oranges as they bounced wildly around on his display, the shopkeeper shouted, “Earthquake!”