Chasing Down the Moon

by Carla Baku

  The other couple, a fat woman and a man with a bushy mustache, said nothing. The mustached man had been to her room several times, and he stood with his hat pulled low. The fat woman clutched his arm with both hands.

  “Go on now, girl,” said the one called Teddy. “You don’t belong on this side of town. Move on.” He stamped his foot and pointed up the street. Ya Zhen moved away from them, not sure whether she should try to go around back or move off in the direction the man had pointed.

  “There you are!” A white-haired woman, quite a bit shorter than Ya Zhen and with a military bearing, stepped out of a carriage right at the corner. “Hello there, everyone,” she said to the two couples. “Elsie Dampler, it’s so nice to see you again.” She lowered her voice a bit. “I hope we didn’t hurt your feelings the other night.”

  The fat woman smiled stiffly. “Heavens, no,” she said. Her ears turned bright pink. “I’d already forgotten about it, Mrs. Huntington.”

  “Well, that’s grand.” She held out her hand to Elsie’s husband. “Charlie Dampler, how are you? Isn’t it a lovely day? I told Reverend Huntington that we’d have sunshine again and goodness if I wasn’t right.”

  Charlie took off his hat and shook her hand. “I’m fine, ma’am,” he mumbled. His eyes slid toward Ya Zhen and then away.

  “Heavens, where are my manners?” the small woman said. “My dear, I’m Lucy Huntington.” She took Ya Zhen’s hand and shook it; her grip was strong, and the fierceness under her sweet expression made some wild thing break out inside Ya Zhen. It wanted to roar, that wild thing, wanted to turn on the four people standing at the hotel door with tooth and claw. It was all she could do to smile calmly in return. “Elsie, Charlie,” Lucy continued, “this young lady is Ya Zhen. She’s been good enough to agree to help me get ready for Reverend Huntington’s birthday dinner next week.”

  Elsie’s mouth opened as if to speak, then closed again. Charlie kept busy, inspecting his fingernails with tremendous concentration.

  “Now listen, you four,” said Lucy. “I want you to tell me you can be there. I know, I know you’re Methodists, but we certainly expect an inter-denominational guest list.” She chuckled, a surprisingly deep and throaty sound.

  The man called Teddy snorted. “I’m not interested in being introduced to a Chinese whore. Come on folks, we’re going to be late for lunch.” He pulled open the hotel door and ushered the peacock woman inside.

  “Enjoy your crab,” Lucy called. Charlie made as if to follow them, then looked back at his wife, who was still on the sidewalk.

  Elsie hesitated, and lowered her voice to a confidential tone. “Mrs. Huntington, it does seem as though you ought to have picked her up over in Chinatown.” She nodded toward Ya Zhen. “It doesn’t look good, a…a person like her standing on a street corner in the middle of town.”

  Lucy had taken Ya Zhen’s elbow and helped her into the carriage. “Nonsense. That wouldn’t have been convenient for either of us,” she said. “After all, Ya Zhen lives here at Salyer’s.” She climbed up next to Ya Zhen and took the reins. “Anyway,” she called, “it’s a free country, isn’t it? Can’t a person stand outside on a weekday afternoon enjoying the weather? Certainly that can’t be a crime. Come on, Buster.” She touched the end of her whip to Buster’s flank and waved to Elsie and Charlie as the horse pulled away.

  Ya Zhen turned in her seat and looked back. Charlie held the door for his wife, but was watching the carriage. Ya Zhen, face solemn, waved. Charlie Dampler hurried behind Elsie, white-faced and cringing, looking as though someone had just given him a nasty scare.

  Lucy, thinking that Ya Zhen was looking over her shoulder at the hotel, gave Buster an extra flick of the reins, picking up his speed. “You won’t go back,” she said. “Not if I can help it.” Even as the words left her mouth, she wished she could retrieve the boast, her head suddenly filled with Burns’s lament to the mouse:

  But Och! I backward cast my e'e,

  On prospects drear!

  An' forward, tho' I canna see,

  I guess an' fear!

  We cannot see, Lucy thought. Better not to guess at all.

  Even as busy as they were —October chipmunks, Hazel said— it was the longest day that Rose could remember. The minute she walked into the Kendalls’ house, she found Hazel elbow deep in preparations. Phoebe Kendall had arrived at her parents’ house sometime shortly after dawn, with big ideas. Not content just to have dinner as planned, she instead told her mother that she longed to have “a proper British tea.” Prudence, of course, told Phoebe it was a wonderful idea.

  “Where does that girl get these things into her head?” Hazel said. “She wouldn’t know a British tea if it jumped down her throat. Look at all this.” The entire surface of the kitchen table was covered with food in the midst of preparation, as was the long counter near the sink: jars of candied ginger, chow-chow, and dilly beans to be put in serving dishes; eggs to be hard-boiled and deviled; quarts of blackberry jam and cherry preserves to be put into china saucers along with dainty silver spoons.

  “She also wants finger sandwiches —chicken salad, no crusts— cream scones, and petit fours. Petit fours, if you don’t mind. I didn’t even know what they were. Prudence had to tell me. Little cakes. Tiny little frosted cakes. ‘Now Hazel,’ she tells me, ‘I know this is above-and-beyond. Just do what you’re able.’ You know what that means, though, don’t you?”

  Rose still gawked at the preparations that covered every available inch of flat surface. Her mind was swamped with the details of Lucy Huntington’s plan, and she wasn’t entirely sure what her aunt had just asked. “I…what does what mean?”

  Hazel cleared her throat for emphasis and spoke in an exaggerated imitation of sweet, cultured voice of Prudence. “It actually means, ‘I’d like you to do it all, Hazel, just as asked, without so much as a wrinkle in the plans or a substitution in the menu. Make it look simple, dear. Make it look easy, so that I can always ask you to do it again sometime.’ That’s what it means. Thank heavens you got here a little early,” she said, beating butter into creamy submission in a large bowl. Her sleeves were rolled high, and her mixing arm looked strong as a young man’s, bicep bulging and tendons standing out. “Rose,” she said loudly, seeing her looking around in stunned confusion. “Jump in somewhere, girl—we have a beastly day bearing down on us. You can pick that bird, to start with, and chop it up fine for the salad.”

  The boiled chicken rested in a pan, under a tea towel. Rose sat at the crowded table and began the greasy job of getting the meat off the bones. “How long do we have?”

  Hazel laughed, a not-very-amused snort. “The princess has asked for a tea,” Hazel said, “and a tea it is. They’ve invited five others; we’ll serve the eight of them at four o’clock.”

  Rose’s hands, glazed with fat and amber bits of jellied broth, froze over the diminishing chicken carcass. “Four? Aunt…I can’t—”

  Hazel stopped whipping the butter, and she glared at Rose. “Don’t—you—dare,” she said. Her voice was low, almost a whisper, and she punctuated each word by stabbing her mixing spoon in Rose’s direction. Tiny flecks of butter flew off and speckled the floor between them. “I’ve had enough, Rose Allen. Enough of you rambling off to Chinatown and not coming back until long after you’re needed. Enough disappearing without a word. Last night was bad, but then this morning—you and Mattie both rushing out before first light. Oh, yes,” she said, “I heard you go. I was born at night, but I wasn’t born last night, by Christ.” Rose was alarmed to see tears in Hazel’s eyes. “She’s a sick girl, Rose. Mattie is ill. More than you know.”

  Rose kept her eyes on her work. “I know about the opium.”

  “You think you know.” Hazel snapped. “She got into the laudanum, did you know that? Poured some right out of the bottle. I don’t know if it was last night or this morning, but there’s quite a bit gone. That’s something she’s never done before—broken trust with me.” She measured sugar into her bowl an
d began beating again. “She’s broken trust with herself, time and again. This is the first time she’s broken trust with me, though. It hurts, I admit it, but will hurt her more.” She looked around the chaotic kitchen then, as if just remembering where she was. “Do you know what to put in the salad after you’ve minced that chicken?”

  Rose looked stupidly at the bird and went back to pulling the last shreds of meat free. “Yes,” she said. “I remember.” A ball of regret and hurt and worry swelled inside her, a hydra-headed mass of concerns that made it hard to breathe. Her hands shook as she set the pile of picked-over bones aside and grabbed the butcher’s knife to dice celery and pickles. She wanted to go find Mattie and see that she was safe—or slap her. She longed to be back at the mercantile with Bai Lum, and little Shu-Li. And a part of her, a rather distressingly large part, she thought, wanted to stay right where she was, helping Hazel with this mountain of tasks, and then simply go home and climb into her own warm bed with a cup of cocoa and her books. Most desperate of all, though, grinding around inside her like a mill wheel, was the knowledge that the Huntingtons were counting on her help.

  “Don’t forget a dab of horseradish. Gives it a little kick. Captain Kendall likes that.”

  “I won’t forget.”

  A long silence spun out between them, filled only with the sound of Hazel’s bowl and spoon, then the flour sifter and more stirring. A peal of female laughter came from the front parlor, Phoebe saying, “But it’s true, Mama!”

  Hazel made a long, weary sound, like taking up a dirge.

  “I’ll give you a task to do,” Lucy Huntington said. “Something to keep you looking busy. That’s the story we’re concocting, and we want everyone to believe it.”

  The carriage ride had taken three times as long as it needed to. Lucy’s most immediate concern when she collected Ya Zhen at Salyer’s was to stay visible and be sure that as many people as possible saw her bringing her to the rectory. Every time the carriage passed someone on the street, she waved, called —Good morning! How are you! Wonderful day, isn’t it?— even when it meant leaning halfway out of the buggy to be seen. Not wanting to risk distressing the girl, Lucy explained only a little of what they had planned, promising that she would tell her everything later. She expected confusion, perhaps fear, but Ya Zhen seemed utterly content, looking around at everything as Buster clip-clopped up one street and down another, happily taking a route home that seemed to cover nearly every road in town.

  Now she sat at the long dining room table, surrounded by every bit of silver in the house, and even some of the candlesticks from the church. Lucy showed her how to coat each item with a dab of polish, to work her way into the crevices and concavities, and then rub with a clean cloth to get a shine. “Slowly,” she whispered, “and don’t be too careful. Let’s see if we can make this job last. If you get through everything, just pick up a fork and start over, yes? It’s all for show.” Ya Zhen nodded, starting right off with a squat little cream pitcher.

  She’s all in, Lucy thought, relieved by Ya Zhen’s apparent composure. She took a seat nearby and spread a voluminous tablecloth over her lap, one which she’d been embroidering for weeks with a wide ramble of violets and English ivy around the hem. “I’m going to stay right here and keep you company, if you don’t mind. We’ll have visitors soon enough.” She’d already poured tea for each of them, and sipped from her cup before threading her needle. She was, in fact, counting on the usual parade of parishioners, a few of whom couldn’t survive Sunday-to-Sunday without an invariable load of snipes and petty jealousies for Lucy’s or Charles’s listening ears. “You just sit there, Ya Zhen, and pretend you don’t understand a blessed thing. Most of it is blather that isn’t worth a spit in the ocean anyway.” Ya Zhen surprised her by looking up and laughing, and Lucy smiled back, two co-conspirators.

  Almost as if on cue, not six minutes passed before Louise Biddle, a tall scarecrow of a woman who seemed to spend more time at the rectory than she did in her own home, sat primly next to Lucy, her thin brown hair stuffed haphazardly under a tiny hat that sported a stuffed bird so large and badly attached that it wobbled back and forth as if looking for its chance to fly off. Lucy worked her needle and nodded while Louise told an occasionally tearful story about the bad behavior of her husband. Every few minutes she threw a sidelong glance at Ya Zhen.

  “Now, Mrs. Huntington, are you sure she can’t understand English?” the woman finally whispered. “I can’t help feeling peculiar telling you all of this with that girl sitting right there.”

  Lucy didn’t lie outright. “She won’t understand you in the least.” Isn’t that the truth? she thought. I don’t understand you, either. She smiled benignly. “Not to worry, Louise. I assure you, you can speak freely. Of course,” she added in a quiet voice, “it’s best that I stay nearby while she polishes the silver. More tea?” Ya Zhen continued with the ornate ladle in her hands, seeming to pay no more attention to their conversation than she would have to two ravens calling each other from opposing tree branches.

  Louise Biddle nodded sagely at Lucy, took the tea, and recollected how her Joe never failed to fall asleep before she even had a chance to wash the supper dishes. A world of woe.

  Didn’t it always come down to some damned woman? Garland Tupper’s wife, God rest her, had forever mealy-mouthed him. Couldn’t say boo to a goose. Wouldn’t cuss a rat if it ran over her boot. His own mother, also long dead, had known the way to cope with life. And with a man. Many the time was that Garland’s father had taken after his wife with whatever was at hand —stove length, bridle, razor strop— and though she might come through it black-and-blue, his mother gave as good as she got, leaving her stripe on the man she married, and many a dark mark on the men she bore. Garland Tupper’s wife had had no such starch in her spine. He’d married her for her sweetness, but it soon chafed him. His wife had been a creeper, a coddler, a timid trifle of a person. Once the vows were said, once he got under the crinolines and got her kindled with their boy, she’d wanted to turn Byron into a wilting willy, filling his head with fairy stories and flower picking and the naming of animals meant for the table. Garland thought that Byron losing his mother early would thicken the boy’s skin, shave some of the dreamy edges off him, but here he was so soft-headed over a Chinese whore that he’d burned up the goddamned tool shed.

  It was all much on his mind when he woke on Friday, conscious even before he opened his eyes of the powerful stink of wet char hanging about the yard. His fist was stiff, too, from giving that boy his licks, and he flexed it a few times, sitting on the edge of his bed.

  Catching Byron mooning around Salyer’s last night had been a lucky thing, especially grabbing him before he’d gotten upstairs with that little painted cat again. This was always the way with his son, some remnant of his mother’s soft-headedness, a bad seed that had sent down roots and couldn’t be grubbed out. Byron grabbed like a starfish onto things that tripped his fancy, always had. And, like a starfish, getting him to turn loose usually meant nearly ripping a limb from the boy’s body. Much as Garland hoped the lesson he’d given last night would break this new fascination, deep down he knew it wasn’t so. Letting the air out of his son’s half-cocked notion was, he reckoned, going to require getting into Salyer’s and —one way or another— spoiling the fantasy.

  He shuffled to the cold stove and poured some of the coffee Byron had made yesterday — gone bitter as bile, to be sure, but dressed up tolerable by a fat first knock of Thistle Dew.

  The day passed in a sprint. By two o’clock, Rose and Hazel had baked and simmered and sliced and polished and set out a dozen china bowls and saucers. At half past three, Prudence put the hideous flower arrangement in the center of the table, and Phoebe made a face and took it away. By three forty-five, Rose had arranged chairs, answered the bell, taken coats, and looked at the clock more times than she could count.

  Captain Kendall arrived home just as the last guest arrived; they could hear him in the parlor, char
ming everyone. Desultory murmurs became animated conversation. In a moment, he poked his head in at the kitchen door. When he saw that Hazel’s back was turned, he winked at Rose and put a finger to his lips. He darted into the room and grabbed Hazel into a quick polka, dancing her around the room. She swatted at his shoulder, trying to bluster, not able to keep a straight face. The floor was still greasy where Hazel had earlier flicked butter when lecturing Rose, and as David Kendall spun Hazel around, his right foot flew out, landing him squarely on his prat with a thud.

  “Serves you, doesn’t it,” cried Hazel, out of breath and trying not to laugh, the color high in her cheeks.

  “Nothing damaged but my terrible pride,” he panted, “and that’s not a mortal wound.” He got to his feet and brushed at his trousers. “Thanks, both of you, for all of this. Phoebe’s delighted.”

  “Then I suppose all’s right with the world,” Hazel said in her sweetest voice. Rose could hear the peeve underneath, but Kendall pretended not to notice.

  “Thanks for the dance, too, Hazel,” he said, and ducked out quick.

  “Good Lord,” she said, shaking her head. “Gammy man.”

  Rose didn’t reply. She frantically scraped dishes into the swill bucket and stacked them next to the deep soapstone sink. It was almost four-thirty, and her desperation to leave was nearly strangling her. The platter she held banged against the edge of the counter and broke. Pieces fell to the floor at her feet. “Damn!”

  “Careful,” Hazel said. She bustled over and took the remaining wedge of broken china. “Here,” she said, handing her a towel. “Wipe your hands.” Rose did, and couldn’t help another quick glance at the time.

  “Listen to me,” Hazel said. “I’m an awfully impatient person. I don’t mean to be, but I was born with it. So were you, Rosie.” Rose nodded, feeling tears burning at the back of her eyes. “I used to tell my mother it was like an itch I couldn’t scratch,” Hazel continued, “wanting things to happen right away, getting mad when they didn’t. My ma told me over and over that the only cure for what ailed me was to stay on the lookout for the next right choice, and to do it, whatever it was.” She smiled wearily. “You’re not a child. I told your father that you’d do well here, and I intend to keep my word. So you tell me you’ll stay on the lookout, too, for that next right choice, and I’ll believe you.”