Ring of Truth

by Ciji Ware

  The woman smiled, her eyes alight with a gleam of satisfaction. She seemed to be having an “aha” moment, as if Tara were the solution to a puzzle, the missing clue to the Times Saturday crossword, the Higgs Boson particle. The genuine warmth of that smile was startling in a city known for people whose only means of connecting was a click on Tinder or a response to a Craig’s List ad.

  “Are you okay?” the woman asked.

  Tara nodded. “Thank you.” Usually, Tara was the giver of help, not the receiver, but she had her balance again, disaster avoided, and she hadn’t spilled Eddie’s coffee.

  “Your bag must weigh twenty pounds.” Again there was that sympathetic smile. The woman released Tara’s arm as the others at the stop boarded.

  “You planning to go to work today, girl?” the conductor called.

  Tara put one foot on the wide running board.

  “Wait!” The woman dipped a hand into the pocket of her trench coat. “I have something for you.” Out came a ring box of scuffed burgundy leather. “Take this. Read everything. Trust me. It will change your life.” She tucked the box in Tara’s jacket pocket.

  Tara just had time to crook her elbow around a pole before the car lurched into motion. She swung around to look back at the woman on the pavement, still standing there with that satisfied smile.

  “My life is fine,” she called over the clatter of the cable car.

  “You’ll see. Don’t let your bag hold you back.” The woman waved a friendly goodbye. Then she turned and slipped around the corner into the fog.

  Tara leaned slightly, feet braced, adjusting to the slant of the car with its uphill angle. Two things puzzled her, about which she could not satisfy her curiosity while the cable car rattled along at its nine-mile-an-hour pace. She wanted to know what was in the box, and why the woman had picked her to receive it.

  The woman hardly had the look of a terrorist, at least not the media’s idea of a terrorist in a black ski mask and camo gear, and the box that rested against Tara’s hip didn’t tick or vibrate like an explosive device. Still, life-changing seemed a stretch. And as Tara was hardly in need of a life makeover, she found the woman’s urgency and her words as curious as the box itself.

  Her training kicked in as she reviewed the incident. As a concierge Tara made it a practice to listen between the lines, as it were, to figure out what clients were really asking. That’s why the woman’s comments about Tara’s bag puzzled her. She had basically warned Tara that her bag, her favorite bag, was in her way. Tara had to disagree. Her bag made her better equipped for disaster than an astronaut headed for the space station, or explorers headed for the eight-thousand-foot depths of the Chevé cave system in Oaxaca. When disaster struck, Tara could always pull something out of her bag to save the day.

  In Tara’s experience one had to be prepared because disaster never came with plenty of warning, like an axe murderer in a slasher flick while the power was out, thunder rumbled, lightning flashed, and the heroine descended alone down the dark, creaking stairs of a deserted farmhouse toward the unexplained noise in the basement as the whole audience silently screamed, Don’t go there!

  Oh no, disaster came on sunny days, when things were going well, and your guard was down. A smart person knew how to be ready. A smart person had a safety pin, a flashlight, a Band-Aid, spot cleaner, mace, or a pair of chopsticks that could be pressed into service to save the day. Tara always carried chopsticks in her bag. In fact, she had developed a system that was way ahead of airport security. Her bag was perfectly organized with what she liked to think of as her “kits,” zippered clear plastic containers, ready for any and all emergencies.

  Within minutes the cable car reached the top of its climb and turned east along Washington Street. At her stop Tara hopped off and headed for the hotel at her usual brisk pace, the mystery box bouncing against her hip with her stride. A few doors from the black and gold awning of the Hotel Belmont, where a narrow alley opened to the back entrances of several buildings, she knew she’d find Eddie cocooned in his drab green sleeping bag under a cardboard shelter.

  San Francisco had an uneasy relationship with its street people. Churches sheltered them, non-profits fed and trained them, ER rooms treated them, the police periodically cleared them from the latest up-and-coming neighborhood, and tourists and business people tried not to see them. But Eddie wasn’t some random homeless person; he was her friend.

  Tara had met him her first day on the Belmont job. That day he’d been rolling up his sleeping bag and tucking it into a well-worn backpack, looking like an out-of-place mountain hiker, an urban Ansel Adams, with his wide-brimmed canvas hat. She put his age at pushing fifty with his lined and weathered face, his full graying beard and mustache, his bright eyes, and his squashed nose that hooked like a backwards J.

  He had sized her up instantly. “Running away from home?”

  The question had caught her off guard. “On my way to work.” She had started to wish him a good day, not wanting to be rude, but inclined to move on without engaging, when he’d fallen into step with her, shouldering his pack.

  “Then what’s with the suitcase you’re carrying? It looks like you have all your worldly belongings with you.”

  “Just a few items for emergencies.”

  He had glanced at her bag again. “What sort of emergency are you expecting? Earthquake? Terrorist attack? Alien invasion? You look like you’re good to shelter in place for a month.”

  He made her laugh.

  “I can definitely get through a rough day.”

  “You an EMT?”

  She had laughed again. “A concierge at the Belmont.” She had wanted to share her new job excitement with someone now that her grandmother was gone.

  Their path brought them to the corner across from the Belmont. As they waited for the light, Tara could not help admiring the hotel, once the modest palace of an early twentieth century millionaire. It had been built after the devastating 1906 earthquake and restored by the Dorset Hotel Group in the ’90s.

  “You’ll be fine if you roll with the punches.”

  Eddie’s comment made her stop and look at him more carefully. He sounded like her grandmother. “What makes you so sure?” she’d asked him.

  “Lots of punches.” He pointed to his squashed nose. “Lots of rolling.”

  The light changed, and she started across the street, but Eddie didn’t move.

  “Just don’t let that George scare you,” he advised. He waved and turned away.

  George, it turned out was the Hotel Belmont doorman, a figure of imposing grandeur. He and Eddie were opposites in appearance, if not in character. George, all polish and no nonsense from his top hat and overcoat with its gold shoulder bars to his white gloves and taxi whistle, ruled the pavement in front of the Belmont and indeed the whole block. Nothing disturbed the Belmont’s guests as he greeted them or saw them off on excursions round the city.

  Since that first morning, meeting Eddie had become a ritual. He had places to go during the day, but he liked to return to his North Beach haunts to sleep.

  When Tara turned into the alley where Eddie was currently camping, she found him still under his damp cardboard roof, the end of his sleeping bag just visible behind a low iron gate at the foot of the back steps of a pale green Victorian townhouse wedged between a pair of newer brick condos. A string of foggy days, rare for January, had deepened the damp chill in the alley.

  She set the bag of coffee and socks on the step below the gate and knocked on the wall. “Your wake-up call, sir.”

  Eddie liked to say that he needed just two things in the morning—good black coffee, and clean socks. “You’ve got to take care of your feet. You’re on ‘em all day.”

  When he didn’t wake to her greeting, Tara lingered, wanting to be sure he was okay before she left him. She wasn’t due at the hotel until the morning staff meeting.

  She glanced up and down the alley, seeing only fog and damp. No one was about. Eddie liked to be up
and gone before most people were stirring. He had a theory that he was repurposing San Francisco’s only excess housing capacity by sleeping in doorways while homeowners were away.

  “Hey, it’s unused housing space, and it can house me for a while and save a shelter bed for someone who really needs it.”

  What surprised Tara was that Eddie was pretty good at figuring out when people were away. On top of that he had dozens of survival strategies for using the city itself. In exchange for a shower, he did errands for a fellow vet who was wheelchair bound, and he had two luxuries, a PO box at a friendly postal annex site in the Embarcadero and a library card. He knew where to take a safe daytime nap, and where to store his few possessions, and he could sell the $1 Street Sheet to San Francisco’s movers and shakers in their thousand dollar suits with Rolexes on their wrists.

  She hesitated, unsure whether to wake him or not when he stirred and stretched. He gave her a hoarse croak of a good morning and reached for the coffee through the wrought iron gate.

  “Are you okay?” She couldn’t really judge in the gray gloom.

  He took his first swig of coffee. “Sure. Did you break up with that absentee boyfriend of yours yet?”

  “Nope.”

  Eddie asked about Tara’s boyfriend nearly every time they met, and Tara had yet to confess that Justin Wright was the perfect boyfriend because he was pure fiction, an invention of Tara’s own fertile imagination. She had invented Justin after her relationship with her college boyfriend Daniel flamed out in their late twenties, and a series of very bad Internet match-ups had left her feeling that she had no clue how to handle the post-college dating scene. Justin had been with her ever since. Or not with her, as she’d made him a consultant, always on the move to different client sites, usually foreign.

  “Where’s he off to this week?”

  “He’s got a consulting job in Sweden.” That got Eddie’s attention. Her remark caught him mid-sip, and he had a brief coughing fit before he could speak again.

  “Sweden! Sweden! He can’t take you anywhere while he’s in Sweden. No tapas at Bocadillo’s or drinks at the Top of the Mark looking out over the bay. What good is he?”

  “Eddie, he’s got to make a living.”

  “Dump him, Tara girl. The guy must have a suitcase for a heart. Go out with my guy. I’m telling you Jack is the one for you. Just say the word, and I’ll connect you two.”

  “Thanks for thinking of me, Eddie, and I’ll hold you to that promise about your Jack. He’ll be my ace in the hole if things don’t work out with Justin.”

  “How can things work out if the guy’s in Sweden?”

  “It’s a global romance, Eddie.” She pulled out her medical kit, extracted a couple of cough drops, and offered them through the gate. He shook his head and held up the coffee.

  “I’ve got what I need. Watch out for that George, Tara girl.”

  “You watch out for that cold.” She pocketed the cough drops he’d refused. Eddie was one independent man. “See you tomorrow.”

  George gave Tara a warm greeting and held the door for her. He might frown and bristle if Eddie crossed the hotel’s invisible outer border, but he was a great ambassador for the hotel to all its guests. It was a shame that two of her favorite men had no use for one another. You couldn’t meet George without thinking you could rely on him, but he was haughtier than Downton Abbey’s butler, Carson, and regarded Eddie as a fenced dog regards a passing squirrel. At some time she knew they had had words. Eddie was a man who would have no patience with George’s claim to own the public street.

  George held the door for her, and she passed into the hotel. Few rooms in San Francisco matched the high-ceilinged lobby of the Hotel Belmont for quiet, old-fashioned elegance and the feeling that one had entered a well-managed private home. The tall gilt-framed antique mirrors and curated California oil paintings on the pale yellow walls, the fresh flower arrangements that spilled from blue and white vases on polished antique tables, the rich carpets, and fabrics that muted the sound of the city outside—all gave the room a feeling of old family wealth. Guests could gather in deep armchairs by the fireplace for coffee and pastries in the morning, or enjoy wine and cheese and bay views in the afternoon. And the place offered free Wi-Fi. Tara felt the Belmont offered visitors the best of old San Francisco’s stateliness with a good dose of convenience as a bonus. As she crossed the lobby, she waved at Jennifer at the reception desk then shifted direction as Hadley Stewart signaled her from the concierge desk.

  Hadley had the phone to her ear, her hand across the receiver. “What’s the number of that 24-hour pharmacy you like? The guest in 403 left his meds behind.”

  Tara set down her bag, reached for a hotel notepad, and wrote the number.

  Hadley mouthed a thank you as she punched the number into the phone. It was a small thing, but it was what Tara did, a hundred times a day, what she was good at. Helping Hadley help a guest made Tara feel her day was back on track. She crossed to the elevator alcove and the staff room door.

  In the staff room she put her bag in her locker and clipped her Belmont badge to her jacket lapel. While the brand managers of the Dorset Hotel Group liked most of the employees in uniform, the dress code for the concierge staff specified business chic. For Tara that meant gray suits, dressy sweaters, heels, and pearls. Once she was ready for work, Tara reached for the life-changing mystery box. She had it in her hand when her boss, the general manager, Arturo Villanova, and her fellow staff members entered. She dropped the box back in her pocket and took her place at the table.

  Arturo held a regular Thursday meeting to outline staff coverage for the weekend’s events and to identify any special attention that particular clients required. The Belmont drew quite a few repeat guests, whose needs were well known. For the most part the staff who reported directly to Arturo made an experienced crew that worked well together. Jennifer managed the reception desk, Hadley headed housekeeping, Josephine Miles was the chef, and Noah Tibbs was in charge of valet parking and bellmen. Security was another matter. The Belmont relied on a group of four taciturn hulks, who had the social graces of San Francisco’s own Dirty Harry. Everyone had been trained to call them for situations that required muscle rather than courtesy and graciousness, but they didn’t attend staff meetings, and no one hung out with them. Tara had never called them.

  “On your toes everyone.” Arturo plugged in his tablet and flicked on the screen that laid out the weekend’s staffing details. He turned, paused, and glanced around the room at his theatrical best. “Why do people come to San Francisco?”

  In unison they groaned the expected answer to that very rhetorical question, “Romance.”

  “So at the Belmont we give them romance.” There was the smallest hint of Arturo’s native Spain in his raspy smoker’s voice, and Tara thought he would make a good Gypsy King. Arturo had a following in the business because he set the highest standard of hospitality. He would spare no effort to improve a guest’s stay. He instilled pride in everyone at the Belmont.

  He rubbed his hands together gleefully. “Even though this is low season, at the Belmont we have a busy weekend ahead—two anniversaries, one honeymoon, one rehearsal dinner, and one—marriage proposal party.” His tone implied that other, lesser hotels deserved to be empty. He turned to the screen with its calendar of room occupancy and staffing needs by date.

  In spite of Arturo’s obvious satisfaction with their success, Tara found herself fading in and out of attention. She knew just which junior suite he had set aside for the couple celebrating their fiftieth anniversary as well as the deluxe room where he would put the newlyweds. Her left hand in her suit jacket pocket encountered the worn little box, and its scuffed surface reminded her of the mystery woman’s words. She was replaying those words in her mind when Arturo made a dramatic pause.

  “Now, listen up children, timing is everything on Saturday. Our groom-to-be wants uninterrupted privacy for his evening marriage proposal moment.” With his next bre
ath, Arturo mentioned a name that got Tara’s full attention. She nearly came out of her seat.

  “Wait. Who’s proposing to whom?”

  Arturo frowned at Tara’s interruption. Hadley gave her a nudge to suggest caution. One didn’t interrupt Arturo.

  “Daniel Lynch.”

  Noah chimed in. “The boy billionaire of Warp Speed Capital. He’s proposing to the banking heiress, Nicola Solari, the one that looks like Scarlett Johansson.”

  Tara knew that her jaw had not literally dropped, but she could feel her slight double chin. She wouldn’t catch stray insects, but she probably looked stunned. Her ex-boyfriend was coming to the Hotel Belmont to propose to a woman who appeared in the society pages of every publication in the city. No charity event happened without her fashionable presence. Tara was no hockey fan, but that her ex-boyfriend Daniel was bringing Nicola Solari to the Belmont to receive his proposal counted as a full-body check.

  Stunned, unable to hear Arturo through the buzz in her mind, Tara felt the strongest urge to jump up from the table, grab her bag, and run. It made no sense. She ought not to care. She did not love Daniel, so what was this feeling of devastation about? She would figure it out later. Right now she needed to focus, stay in her chair, and behave like a professional. She pulled the little box from her pocket, folded her hands around it in her lap, and held on.

  As Arturo went on filling in the details of Daniel’s extravagant proposal plans, Tara’s mind began to throw up explanations for her distress. Maybe it was simply that Daniel’s plans emphasized her lack of plans. Somehow Daniel had moved on while Tara had become stuck. She had not been paying attention, or she would have noticed Daniel appearing as Nicola’s escort in the society pages. Now Daniel was proposing to a woman who was rich, thin, and beautiful, while she, Tara, was saving her pennies, dating an imaginary boyfriend, and dressing to minimize the effects of her love affair with salted chocolate gelato and a certain North Beach arugula-topped pizza. When was the last time she had gone running? She would have to start again.