“There is help, just there, at the Pacific Garden Mission.” She pointed.
Ida raised thin eyebrows. “Those are church folks. We sinners aren’t good enough for them, especially. None of us are likely to go anywhere we’d feel even worse about ourselves.”
“It’s not like that, I’m sure,” Sylvie pressed. “That’s why the Mission is there, to help anyone who needs it. Anyone. Jesus would turn none away.”
Beth shot her a look, and Sylvie wondered if she’d overstepped.
Ida rolled her darkly outlined eyes. “Jesus wants nothing to do with us. And we get along fine without Him.”
“Surely you don’t mean that,” Sylvie said.
“You know, I think she does.” Beth tapped her umbrella’s tip on the doorstep, rotating it by the handle.
“This is taking far too much of my time.” Ida leaned out the door. “But because you could use an education, I’m going to tell you. A lot of us here are happy with our lot. We’re eating better than we ever did before. Our clothes may not be up to your standards, but they’re a whole lot better than the rags we used to wear. We get beauty treatments for our hair and skin all the time. That’s instead of lice.”
Sylvie grasped for something to say and came up with nothing better than, “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. We’re better off. And with the Fair, business is so good we can hardly keep up with it. So if you see any young beauties needing work, send them our way, will you?”
The door shut soundly.
Beth blinked at Sylvie. “Well! That’s one big question answered, at least.” She led the way down the stairs.
Sylvie trailed her, a deep sadness weighting her steps as they crossed the street. “Oh, Beth,” she said. “Sometimes I feel like we’re doing some good at Hull House. But there’s so much brokenness in this city. It breaks my heart.”
Opening her umbrella against the slanting sun, Beth circled to stand in front of Sylvie. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Don’t feel guilty about all the lost sheep. You can’t fix everyone. And you were right about the Pacific Garden Mission. It’s right there”—she jabbed her finger in a forceful point—“and people know it’s there. It’s their choice to accept that help or not. It’s not up to you. Just be glad we know Rose isn’t mixed up in that.”
“I am. I can’t tell you how glad.” Sylvie released a long, slow breath, expelling former fears and worries. “I just—” Frowning, she stepped aside to peek around her friend. “Beth! Isn’t that Ladislava Mazurek? Ivan’s little sister. Lottie.”
Beth spun and gasped. “It is.”
Lottie came toward them, a ragged bonnet half covering her raven-black hair. She focused on the signs hanging in front of each brothel. Still not noticing Beth or Sylvie, the fifteen-year-old stopped in front of Carrie Watson’s, then slowly took that first step.
Beth was the first to reach her. Her long fingers encircled Lottie’s wrist. “Lottie, dear, what are you doing?”
Sylvie flanked the girl’s other side, her pulse thrumming.
Lottie blanched, then turned red from collar to hairline. “How did you know? How did you find me?”
Beth glanced at the brothel door. “We’ll talk about it somewhere else, all right?”
Sylvie looped her arm around Lottie’s waist, gently guiding her away. She didn’t know the girl well. She wasn’t in the Hull House Players and had never come to Readers Club. But there was no way on God’s green earth she was about to let her hand her soul to Carrie Watson.
“I can’t go home yet, I just can’t,” Lottie cried.
Tight-lipped, Sylvie caught Beth’s attention over the girl’s head. “Oh yes, you can. We’re going with you.”
“No!” Lottie twisted and broke away, bolting down the block.
“Stop!” Beth shouted and gave chase alongside Sylvie.
Sylvie’s boot heels faltered on the uneven surface, cranking her ankle awry, but she felt nothing as she scrambled after Lottie. Strands of hair pulled free of their pins and whipped across her face. Lungs fighting against her corset, she followed Lottie north, past Polk Street, past the Salvation Army Hotel, a peep show, three saloons, and as many pawn shops. When the girl took a hard left behind Gypsy Vernon’s, Beth pulled ahead of Sylvie, long legs pumping.
Sylvie rushed around the corner and pulled up short.
Lottie had stopped running, caught by a man who held her fast in his arms. He wore a billycock hat, and a cigarette drooped near his stubbly beard. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to his elbows, and his collar splayed open.
“What do we have here? You in some kind of trouble, sweetheart? I’m sure I can help you out.” He tore Lottie’s hat from her head, thrust his fingers into her hair, and dislodged the pins. Her dark tresses tumbled over her shoulders, and he took a hank, rubbing it between his fingers, then brought it to his nose and sniffed.
“Stop!” Sylvie shouted. “Police! Help!”
“Get away from me!” Lottie stomped on the man’s foot, then lunged for the fire escape ladder on the side of the building, grasping the iron bars and kicking at him while Beth ran at him with her umbrella. She struck at his kidney just as the police came pounding toward them from Harrison Street, clubs aloft and handcuffs jangling.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The smell inside Lottie’s home was not her mother’s fault, but Sylvie could think of no polite way to set the poor woman at ease about her housekeeping without edging too close to insult. Situated about a mile west of the Levee, four blocks west of Chicago River’s south branch, all the rear tenements on West DeKoven Street were just as small, the walls as thin, and the air fouled by the outhouses and piles of refuse below the window.
“Please don’t trouble yourself, Mrs. Mazurek.” Sylvie laid her hand on the woman’s shoulder, preventing her from stirring from the cot in the corner of the room. Two bedrolls peeked out from beneath it. The rest of the space was taken up with a table, two chairs, a stool, and stacked milk crates holding dishes and pantry stores. A few changes of clothing hung from nails driven into the wall. The room was bedchamber, parlor, and kitchen all in one. “We’re only here to bring Lottie home.”
Mrs. Mazurek wheezed, then surrendered to a rattling cough far too big for her frame. “And why should a girl her age need help finding her way home?” Poverty had etched more lines in her face, and deeper, too, than the passing years.
Lottie dug her fingernails into Sylvie’s arm, silently reminding her of her promise not to reveal too much. But it was a promise made on one condition, a bargain not easily struck, and Sylvie still didn’t feel right about concealing anything from another mother.
“Sylvie and I were out, and our paths crossed Lottie’s this evening,” Beth offered. “She mentioned you’d taken a turn for the worse, Mrs. Mazurek.”
Lottie had also confessed that her mother’s illness, which had prevented her from working at the feather brush factory for weeks, required medicine they couldn’t afford.
“I don’t need more charity,” came the hoarse retort, even though Sylvie had come without any food this time. “My Ivan and Ladislava, they have jobs. Yes, Ivan found work again, praise the saints. They earn wages, even while I cannot. It is enough, I’m sure. We work for our own keeping.”
Sylvie measured this against what Lottie had told them. The girl’s wages were meager. Even though Ivan was working again, she doubted the combined pay would cover the deficit from their mother’s unemployment. They were already in arears for rent and on the brink of being evicted. “If it means we won’t be homeless and might even have money for doctors and medicine for Matka, I would take any job,” she’d said. “My virtue is not so highly valued that I wouldn’t sell it to save her.”
The door budged open, and Ivan ducked beneath the jamb to enter before wedging it shut again. “I didn’t know we were expecting company.” He went to his mother and kissed her forehead, adjusting the limp pillows behind her back. “My mat
ka isn’t up to entertaining just now.”
Sylvie chafed at his censure. He knew she’d come before with Rose and had never expected to be entertained. “No, of course not. We have a different purpose in mind.”
A few blocks east, trains roared by on the tracks shared by three different railroads, shaking the tenement building and rattling the window. Dingy grey smears flared upward on the wall where soot had seeped between pane and sill.
Whatever had been brewing in Ivan seemed to burn away, his tense shoulders drooping. “News of Rose?”
“Yes, actually,” Sylvie said. “She’s written to say she is fine.”
“But that’s not why we’re here,” Beth cut in, preventing further questions. “Sylvie has a job opening for Lottie, if she’ll have it.”
“But I wanted to discuss it with you—both of you—first.” Mrs. Mazurek was Lottie’s mother, but as Ivan was the man of the family, Sylvie wanted to honor his role, too. She knew how responsible he felt for his mother and sister.
He gestured to the table, and she found herself sitting across from him while Beth and Lottie sat on overturned milk crates.
Sylvie angled her chair so she could better see Mrs. Mazurek, too. “I need some domestic help in my building. I wish to hire Lottie as my housekeeper, for my own apartment and for the two others I manage, if the tenants desire it. Which I think likely. If Lottie doesn’t mind giving up her work at the factory, she could have fewer hours and more pay by working for me.”
“Like Gita Górecki?” Mrs. Mazurek asked. “She will live with you?”
“She would still live here, with her own family,” Sylvie assured the woman, then discussed the terms in detail, at the same time reminding herself she could afford it. With Rose gone, she had one fewer employee on the bookstore payroll and one fewer mouth to feed. Gladly would she pay those costs, but the fact remained that Rose wasn’t coming back, at least not in the near future. Lottie wasn’t suited to work in the bookstore, as she might not even be literate. In time, perhaps, Sylvie could change that, too. But meanwhile, there was still work to be done, and Lottie could help.
Mrs. Mazurek coughed into a handkerchief but nodded to Ivan, who then addressed his much younger sister. “Ladislava, you will do this work for the family.”
A rueful smile bent Sylvie’s lips. She and Beth had saved a girl from the Levee district tonight after all. It just wasn’t Rose.
Upon reaching home, Sylvie whisked into her bedroom and consulted the mirror to see the day’s toll. The sight confronting her wasn’t kind. Neither was the odor from the tenements, sunk deep into her clothing. All she wanted was a brief conversation with Kristof before she retired for the night, but she couldn’t let him see her like this.
Casting her hat and gloves onto the bed, she quickly repaired the damage. She washed her face, donned a fresh shirtwaist and skirt, and brushed and re-pinned her hair. Several new grey strands winked at her. Given the fear and shock she’d entertained since Rose disappeared, she was surprised there weren’t more.
Surely it was vanity to notice, especially when far greater matters pressed for attention. Above her, violin music began and halted, then started the same section again. Good. Kristof was home. Gregor never seemed to practice, at least not in this building. She hated to interrupt but decided not to delay.
Upstairs, Sylvie didn’t have to wait long after knocking before he opened the door.
The expression on his face was unaccountable. Mild surprise, she expected. Perhaps even pleasant surprise, given how close they’d grown of late. Not this. Relief smoothed the ridges from his brow as he scanned her from head to hem.
“Sylvie,” he breathed. “I have been wondering when you’d return.” He rolled down his shirtsleeves and buttoned the cuffs.
“Were you watching for me?”
If Beth were here, she would cluck her tongue and say he was beginning to think he owned Sylvie and her time. That Sylvie had already given him too much.
But this didn’t feel like too much. It felt like coming in out of the cold, her senses thawing by the fire after being numb too long.
He opened the door wider. “Come in, if you like.”
She did, reminding herself she was here for Lottie’s sake, not her own.
The apartment was as neat as it had been the last time she’d been inside. Mail and newspapers were stacked in separate baskets on a table inside the door. In the kitchen, no dirty dishes littered the counter, no jackets were draped over chairs. In the parlor, her father’s memoir and A Tale of Two Cities rested on the tea table. Shelves of books remained as orderly as ever, alphabetized by author last name and arranged by genre.
Gregor sprawled over a wing chair, the only untidy sight in the apartment. Sylvie began to doubt whether Lottie could improve the place.
Kristof moved to the kitchen table and shuffled sheet music into a pile. Then, smelling faintly of coffee and shaving soap, he pulled out a chair for her.
Gregor called out from where he lounged, one arm flung over his eyes. “Oh, save me, Sylvie.” His voice betrayed a cold, which was probably the only reason he wasn’t out on the town right now. “My brother now fancies himself a maestro, and it is I who will pay for it.”
She raised an eyebrow and slid into the proffered seat. “What’s this?”
Kristof sat across from her, then stood again. “Drink?”
“No, thank you. Please sit.”
“By all means,” called Gregor, still not rousing from his repose. “Sit down and compose yourself, Maestro.” He blew his nose into a handkerchief.
Sylvie hid a smile. “It looks like you’ve been working. Are the concerts back on?”
“As of tomorrow, yes.” Kristof brushed a crumb from the oak table. “And since Maestro Thomas has resigned as musical director of the Fair and will not return, I am to conduct in his stead. Which means Gregor is now the concertmaster. If he can exert himself to the responsibility.”
Gregor didn’t appear to exert himself for any reason.
“What does it mean, to be concertmaster?” Sylvie asked. A breeze moved through the apartment, feathering her face.
“It means that when the orchestra is in place and ready to begin, Gregor will walk out on stage and take a bow, and the entire audience will clap for him. Then he’ll indicate that the oboist should play an A so the instruments can tune to it. That part I’m sure he’ll enjoy.”
Sylvie could see that. Even his refusal to conform to the polite convention of sitting up when one had a visitor was a way of drawing attention to himself. Suffering a cold was no excuse.
“If only that were all,” Gregor groaned.
“But it isn’t.” Kristof gestured to the sheet music. “The concertmaster is to be a leader among musicians in both integrity and musicianship. He’s also supposed to make sure all the music for every musician has the right markings on it and deliver it to them before the rehearsals so they can practice. And make sure they all have the schedule for section practices, rehearsals, and concerts.”
Sylvie peered down at the scores crowded with notes, dynamic markings, and brief spelled-out directions. Mezzo forte. Pianissimo. Anticipate! “But that’s your handwriting, Kristof.”
Gregor pushed himself up on his elbow and faced her from the parlor. “He’s so much better at it than I am.”
“Only because I’ve been doing it for years,” Kristof told Sylvie quietly. “He could do it if he would only apply himself.”
“Then why doesn’t he?” She looked from him to Gregor, who brought a finger to his lips with theatrical flair.
Then, sighing, Gregor said, “It’s a proven fact. I was born with less patience and far less passion for detail than Kristof.”
“I see,” Sylvie said. “And why should he try when you do it so nicely for him?” As soon as the words left her, she feared she’d said too much. Then again, no one could say her question wasn’t valid.
Lines bracketed Kristof’s mouth. “As much as I would enjoy defending
myself, I don’t suppose this is the reason for your visit.”
“Correct.” Sylvie clasped her hands in her lap, rubbing at her cuticles beneath the table. “I’ve asked a young lady, fifteen years old, to be my general housekeeper. Her name is Lottie Mazurek, and she needs the work. I wondered if you might want her to clean and launder for the two of you, as we—”
“Yes!” Gregor shouted before she’d even finished. “She’s hired, Sylvie.”
“You don’t actually seem to need the help,” she said. Unless, of course, the bedrooms were hidden disasters.
“Rend a lelke mindennek!” Gregor called out. “Right, brother?” He sneezed, then announced he was retiring to his bedroom for the night.
Sylvie sent Kristof a questioning gaze once the door had firmly closed.
“It’s a Hungarian saying,” he explained, “that means ‘Order is the soul of everything.’ Not that he would know from experience.” He rubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw. “You say Lottie needs the work? What would you consider a reasonable weekly wage, and what could we expect from that?”
Sylvie shared her recent calculations and the work it would cover.
“That’s all she would be paid?” he asked.
“If this is how you maintain your apartment, you’re not giving her much to do,” she said. “What I’m suggesting is more than the going rate, and far more than she’s been getting at the factory, but with fewer hours and an atmosphere that won’t put feathers into her lungs as it has her mother. Not to mention that this is honest work that will preserve her virtue.”
“What does that mean? Was she harassed at the factory?” Concern deepened Kristof’s voice.
“I wouldn’t doubt it, but I can’t say for sure.”
“Then why imply her virtue is at stake?”
“You must not think less of her. She’s just a girl,” Sylvie began. “But she was so desperate for income to help pay for her mother’s medicine that she was willing to take a different position. In the Levee.”
Shadows of the White City Page 17