American Pie (16 page)

"Augusta, this is outrageous behavior!" Mrs. Roper held her skirts away from a puddle of bluing and followed in pursuit of her daughter. Every eye in the room watched in amazement. "You will return to the parlor at once! Do you hear? At once!"

Miss Augusta raised her hands to cover her ears and shook her dark curls. "Is there nowhere I can escape? No, Mama, I won't talk about it any more! No, no, no. I will not marry Baron Grieple! He's old and fat and he spits when he talks."

Mrs. Roper cast a furious scowl at the figures standing frozen in the laundry room. "We will not discuss these matters in front of the servants," she hissed through her teeth.

"Excellent! We shall say no more." Swatting at the steam swirling in front of her, Miss Augusta wound between the wash tubs scattered across the floor. "If being here will give me a moment's respite, I'll never leave the laundry."

"You foolish chit!" Mrs. Roper followed into the gauntlet of tubs. Forgetting her own dictum, she raised her voice to her daughter's back. "Don't you realize you could be a baroness?"

"I don't want to be a baroness!" Miss Augusta pressed her hands over her ears. "I want to marry Mr. Charles Whitcomb!"

A look of distaste twisted Axa Roper's sharp features. "Whitcomb! That coal oil Johnny!"

"He's not, Mama. If only you would give him a chance, he"

"We shall never agree to such a misalliance. You must stop behaving so foolishly. You are going to marry the baron!"

Tears spilled down Miss Augusta's cheeks as she rounded the drying racks. Distraught, she threw out her hands, toppling one of the racks. "Do you plan to lock me in my room and keep me prisoner? Like Mrs. Vanderbilt did to poor Consuélo?"

"Poor Consuélo? Consuélo Vanderbilt is now the Duchess of Marlborough!" Envy raised a greenish cast to Mrs. Roper's skin. "Poor Consuélo, indeed!"

Miss Augusta stopped in front of Lucie, not seeing her. Her head dropped into her hands and her lace-clad shoulders convulsed in sobs of despair.

"I'm so sorry," Lucie whispered, not realizing she spoke aloud until Miss Augusta raised her tearstained face and fastened on the sympathy filling Lucie's eyes. A strangled sound tore from her throat, then she whirled on her heel and ran from the laundry, slamming the door behind her.

Everyone swiveled to look at Mrs. Roper. In the sudden silence they could hear the water bubbling on the range top, the popping of the irons as they heated.

Aside from twin circles of crimson flaming on Mrs. Roper's cheeks there was nothing in her manner to indicate an unseemly scene had transpired. She drew herself upright and stepped forward with practiced dignity as if she had deliberately chosen to visit the laundry to inspect the proceedings.

"We'll be into woolens soon," she informed Mrs. Greene. None of the strain thinning her voice appeared in her imperial manner. "Do we have ether on hand for spots?"

"I've laid in a good supply, ma'am." Mrs. Greene's eyes were as wide as the bluing tub.

Moving toward the door, Mrs. Roper paused to inspect the box of starch frozen in Hilda's hand. "Kingsford's Pure? We don't use economy brands in this household, if you please. From now on, you will use Silver Gloss." Hilda nodded, too dumbfounded to speak.

As was Lucie. She forgot to bob her head as Mrs. Roper approached. Mrs. Roper glanced at the chemise draped over the bosom board, then at the iron in Lucie's hand.

"Well? Why are you standing there like a statue? Is that what we pay you for?"

"I no, ma'am." Lowering the iron, she pressed it carefully along Miss Delfi's ribbons, feeling Mrs. Roper's stare.

"You're the one with the lovely skin," Mrs. Roper observed, her voice still sharp. She watched Lucie's hands pushing the iron down the string of ribbons. The barest suggestion of a sigh escaped her lips as she transferred her gaze to her own hands. "I don't know how you manage. I should expect your hands to be red and chapped from the soap and hot water."

"I make a cream, ma'am. It seems to help."

"Oh?" Mrs. Roper turned her gaze to the door so recently slammed by her daughter. "You must bring me a sample one day."

Lucie couldn't believe her ears. Mrs. Roper asking for a sample of her cream. "I would be honored!"

"What?" Distracted, Mrs. Roper turned from the door wearing a look of annoyance.

"To bring you a sample of my cream."

"Oh, yes. Yes, you do that." She opened the door and glanced into the empty hallway and lifted a hand in an absent motion. "You may carry on, Mrs. Greene."

"Thank you for stopping in, ma'am." Finally able to move, Mrs. Greene hurried toward the mistress of the house bobbing her cap up and down in a belated gesture of respect.

Mrs. Roper raised her chin to a regal posture. "One must keep abreast of one's household." With a final nodding glance around the room she lifted her skirts, then hurried down the corridor. "Augusta! Where have you gotten to?"

When Mrs. Roper's voice died away, Lucie exchanged her cool iron for one that was heated. In five minutes they would go to the kitchen for the midday meal and spend the next half hour discussing every tiny detail of this morning's extraordinary events. None the least of which was Mrs. Roper's astonishing request for a sample of Lucie's cream.

Her mind jumped ahead. The minute she completed her Sunday chores, she would ask Stefan to accompany her to the chemist in Mercer Street to purchase the ingredients. Imagining a grand lady like Axa Roper using her cream sent Lucie's spirits soaring. Such a thing could happen only in America.

Moreover she felt a sudden rush of appreciation for Stefan. Although he refused her permission to follow her heart, he did offer her the right of refusal. In some ways, she was richer than Augusta Roper.

The rain began shortly after Jamie boarded the Wall Street horse car. By the time he stepped out of the car in front of Trinity Church and turned up his collar, Wall Street had been churned into a stew of offal, mud and debris. The torrents of muddy water running down the pavement had driven the curb-side brokers indoors and the street appeared deserted.

Feeling the water seeping through the soles of his shoes, Jamie pulled down his cap and dashed through the downpour toward the building where Mr. Jonas Tucker kept his office.

Once inside he shook the rain from his cap and brushed at the dampness on his shoulders. His shoes and pant cuffs were a muddy disgrace, but there was no help for it. On the bright side, the rain would prevent Gustoffer from pouring the load wall.

After rapping at Mr. Tucker's office door he boldly stepped inside and presented himself before a stern-looking man seated behind a large desk. Behind the gentleman two neatly dressed typewriters glanced at him, then continued tapping their fingers across the keys. Jamie would like to have examined the printing machines at closer quarters and question the typewriters about them. But that was not why he had come.

He swept his cap from his dripping hair. "Mr. Tucker?"

The grim-mouthed man looked up from his desk and inspected Jamie with obvious distaste. "I am Mr. Haversham, Mr. Tucker's personal secretary. Do you have an appointment?"

Jamie leaned over the desk and looked Mr. Haversham square in the eyes. "I assure you Mr. Tucker will want to receive me. I've come on a matter of great urgency."

"I'm afraid Mr. Tucker is too busy to receive someone without an appointment."

Jamie leaned farther over the desk. His eyes narrowed and he spoke through his teeth. "I didn't throw away my job and ruin my shoes to be turned aside." Now he saw the second door. "You inform Mr. Tucker that Mr. Jamie Kelly is here from Mr. Tucker's building site on Broadway. And I mean to see him today."

Mr. Haversham's nostrils pinched in a sniff. "I doubt Mr. Tucker will welcome being ordered about by a common laborer."

"I may be a laborer, Mr. Haversham, but I assure you I am not common." One of the typewriters smiled and sent him a sidelong glance. "Now you announce me to Mr. Tucker, or I'll do the job myself," he said, eyeing the door.

Mr. Haversham looked appalled. His face clamped into a disapproving mask as he slowly rose to his feet.

While he waited for Mr. Haversham to emerge from Mr. Tucker's office, Jamie considered what he would do if Mr. Tucker refused to admit him, a possibility that had not previously occurred. What did occur was the dawning impact of realizing he no longer had a job. Some of the ardor cooled from his gaze as his prospects dimmed. Worse, his future with Lucie moved toward an impossibly distant horizon.

"You may step inside," Mr. Haversham announced in a stiff, disapproving tone.

As Jamie entered an office with a stunning view of the harbor, Mr. Tucker rose behind his desk. Anger flickered in his narrowed gaze.

"You had better have a damned good reason for bullying your way into my office, Mr. Kelly."

"I do, sir." Aware he was dripping mud and water on Mr. Tucker's carpet, he moved to stand before a massive polished desk. "I've come about the main bearing wall."

"What in hell are you talking about?" Mr. Tucker sat down behind his desk, but he did not invite Jamie to sit. Leaning back in his chair, he brushed back his lapels and hooked his thumbs beneath his suspenders. His thick steel-colored eyebrows knit in a line across his brow as Jamie explained the problem.

Mr. Tucker stared at him when he finished speaking. "Are you the foreman on the site?" Jamie admitted he was not. "I see. Does my foreman believe the bearing wall is positioned incorrectly?"

"Mr. Gustoffer disagrees with me. He's building the wall where the plan says it should be built."

Mr. Tucker's eyes narrowed. "So who the hell are you?"

"I work at the site."

"A laborer?" Mr. Tucker jumped to his feet and pointed angrily to the door. "Get out of my office. If Gustoffer hasn't fired you for wasting his time, I'm firing you for wasting mine!"

Jamie didn't budge. "Mr. Tucker, if you proceed without correction, the building will eventually crash." Mr. Tucker started around the desk, his face reddening in anger. Then Jamie spoke the magic words. "You will lose a lot of money."

The statement halted Mr. Tucker's progress. He stared at Jamie, trying to evaluate his expression. "What makes you think you're right about this and my architect is wrong?"

"I studied architecture with Goblin and Greene in Dublin. I've worked construction sites since I was wee. Mistakes can happen, Mr. Tucker, expensive mistakes. The question is, can you afford to take the risk that I'm wrong?"

Jonas Tucker turned on his heel and moved to the window.

He stroked his jaw. Finally he rang the brass bell next to an expensive crystal ink well.

"If you're wrong about this, Kelly, I'll have your hide for a lamp shade." When Mr. Haversham appeared in response to the bell, Tucker glared at him. "Send a message to Clem Whitesall. Tell him to meet me at the Broadway site at once."

"Shall I use the telephone, sir? I believe his firm has one." Having received permission, Haversham exited quietly.

"Thank you, Mr. Tucker." In spite of himself, Jamie was impressed that Jonas Tucker possessed a telephone. "You won't regret this."

"I regret it already," Tucker grumbled, reaching for his hat and umbrella. "No, you don't," he snapped when Jamie turned to leave. "You're coming, too. I want to hear you explain to Clem Whitesall how a hammer man knows more than the city's celebrated architect. The only reason I'm agreeing to this tomfoolery is the remote possibility that you may be right."

"I am." The conviction Jamie felt allowed him to meet Jonas Tucker's glare without a waver.

They didn't exchange further words inside Tucker's brougham during the ride to the site. The wheels of the brougham slipped and slid and once it appeared they would collide with a wagon, but Tucker's coachman was a skilled whip and managed to guide a matched set of blacks through the muddy streets without incident.

Still without speaking they stepped to the pavement in front of the site, and Mr. Tucker unfurled his umbrella and moved to scowl into the muddy pit. Jamie stood in the rain, aware that Gustoffer, Stefan and the others sheltering beneath the shed's overhang watched with silent interest, most of them anticipating his forthcoming comeuppance.

Gustoffer shot Jamie an irritated glance, then slogged through the diminishing rain to greet Mr. Tucker. When Stefan started to follow, Gustoffer waved him back to the shed with an angry gesture.

Tucker nodded his bowler toward the dripping forms at the bottom of the pit. "Well?"

"Those forms are spaced exactly as the plans show they ought. Mr. Kelly is dead wrong, sir."

They all turned toward the street as a hansom slid up on the curb and Mr. Clem Whitesall emerged, swearing and kicking at the carriage wheels. He was younger than Jonas Tucker but equally well dressed and equally furious at being called out on a fool's errand.

He charged forward, jabbing his umbrella at the sky. "What's this poppycock about a bearing wall being misaligned?" Advancing with long strides to the edge of the pit, he halted two steps in front of Jamie. "This is an outrage! How dare you question my plans!" He stared at the rain running down Jamie's face, plastering his hair to his skull and his clothing to his body.

In answer Jamie silently turned to face the pit and waved a hand to encompass the view below.

While everyone watched, Clem Whitesall directed his angry glare into the pit and onto the wet forms. His body jerked and his mouth fell open. Then his mouth closed. He stared, blinked, ran a shaking hand over his eyes and stared again. "Good God."

Jonas Tucker's eyebrows arched toward his hat brim. "What? Are you saying the Irishman is right?"

Whitesall rounded on Gustoffer. "You didn't follow my plans!"

"But I did, sir. I followed your plans to the letter!"

"That's not possible." Grim faced, Clem Whitesall stepped off the boards laid over the mud and strode toward the shed, oblivious of his boots and cuffs. The others followed and the pit crews moved backward to allow them inside the shed.

Whitesall went directly to the worktable and flipped through the prints until he found the one he sought. For a long silent moment he stared down at the page.