The Major's Daughter (33 page)

Chapter Twenty-four

A
lbee Spencer's office smelled of cigars and bay rum, but mostly of cigars. It was a dark, dingy office, with an overhead fan twirling as if trying to screw itself out of the ceiling. Estelle could not find a comfortable place to sit, which was not to say that the chairs were uncomfortable but merely poorly placed. One straight-backed chair sat in the corner, and a vast, blue-gray couch took up the northern wall. The standard desk chair that had been put into service in front of the gunmetal desk sat on wheels and looked unsteady. Given the various options, she was not sure where she wanted to sit.

A moment later Albee Spencer came in. He was a dense, bald man of about fifty, with extraordinarily full eyebrows and a pair of bright red braces straining to hold his pants up against a large belly. He resembled a rolling pin, Estelle thought, or a novelty bottle with maple syrup inside. She had seen those kinds of bottles at the state fair, and she had never imagined they might be modeled after someone. For all of that, however, he moved like an anxious bear, stopping midway into the doorway to shout something back at the larger office behind him. The sound of typewriters propelled him into the room. He crossed quickly to his desk and sat down. He did not shake hands or give her any better indication of why she had been asked to visit him.

“You wrote the article on the Red Cross?” he asked, his eyes down at the papers on his desk.

“Yes. . . .”

“Are you going to sit or run out the door? Am I so terrifying?”

He looked up. He had soft eyes, at least, Estelle thought. She sat on the front edge of the desk chair. It rocked a little forward and she had to balance herself.

“Your name is . . . ?”

“Estelle Samuels. I was Estelle Emhoff.”

“Dr. Emhoff's daughter?”

Estelle nodded.

“That explains it,” Albee Spencer said. “You write passably. We need a number of things covered. Are you interested?”

“Covered?”

“Yes, yes, as a reporter,” Spencer said, his temper just bubbling underneath. “Yes, covered . . . local events, school board meetings. Nothing too exciting. You're not going to be Nellie Bly.”

“A reporter?” Estelle asked, still trying to make sense of the request.

“Yes, a local events reporter. This piece you did on the Red Cross . . . it's the kind of thing I'm looking for. Right now we're shorthanded. The war has taken away most of my reporters and the young kids . . . they think they're going to come in here and break the story of the century. And they can't write. I need someone steady to go around and write up the stories we need covered at the
Bugle
. Does that interest you?”

“I've got a baby.”

“Did I say that you didn't? I'm not thrilled about hiring a woman, believe me, but I'm shorthanded, as I say. You seem to have the knack, and what you don't know we can teach you. If you don't think it's a respectable occupation for a woman, then don't waste either of our time. I've got a thousand things to do today.”

“How much would you pay me?” Estelle asked, more to have something to say than to negotiate terms. She felt dizzy and out to sea. What was he proposing exactly? This curious little man.

“We'll pay you by the story. You don't have to come into the office unless you're submitting a story. You'll be a freelancer . . . ever heard of that? A stringer, we could say.”

“I've heard of it.”

He suddenly pushed back in his chair and reached for a cigar left on the edge of an enormous ashtray. The cigar had gone out. He started it again.

“Look . . . it's a pretty simple proposition. I need some things covered. You're local and you write well enough and you're probably in the area for the duration. I'm not expecting more than you can handle, believe me. Most of the events can be covered in an hour or two. Do you have a typewriter?”

She nodded.

“Okay, so you go take notes, you write it up, then you hand it in to the copy boy. Make sure you write a lede and leave something to cut at the bottom. It's not
Gone with the Wind
. It's just local reporting. We'll send a photographer out with you when you need him. I've got a school board meeting tomorrow night and a PTA meeting over in Lawrence Thursday. What do you say we start with that and see where it goes? If you can write more personal stuff . . . flower shows, family reunions, that's all to the good. You can check with me.”

“You're offering me a job?” Estelle asked, still not comprehending. Or rather, she comprehended, but she wanted to hear him say it.

“Yes. A job.”

“I'd have to talk to my husband.”

“You do that and get back to me. Don't sit on this, though. I've got to have someone.”

“Well, thank you,” she said, rising.

The smell of the cigar was really quite something, she reflected. She wasn't sure how to make her exit, so she held out her hand and Mr. Spencer shook it. Then she went back outside into the general office and the swarm of typewriters.

She could not have been more astonished, she realized as she pushed onto Carolina Avenue. The noise of the street seemed to surround her, and she stepped for a moment to the protection of the line of buildings that rose on both sides of the street. She placed her hand against the granite foundation and tried to catch her breath. A job. It was the last thing in the world she had expected to blossom from her article on the Red Cross activities in the Ashtabula area. She had written it at the request of Shirley Grant, a volunteer at the Red Cross in the next town over, and she
had
taken her time with it. It was to run with her name attached, after all, and one didn't want to appear a proper idiot in the newspaper. But now, suddenly, Albee Spencer—George knew him and liked him, and her father had mentioned him many times over the years—had offered her a position. Not a position, she corrected herself, but an arrangement, an assignment. . . . What was the word she was searching for? She didn't know. She pushed herself away from the building and felt a nervous thrill burning in her stomach. But what about Hazel? She could not simply abandon her child to traipse around the county writing up stories about local budget issues. George would be furious; so would her parents. On the second consideration, it made very little sense, even if it was flattering to be asked.

She steadied herself. Louisa had come in to watch Hazel for the morning. There had been some talk about joining George for lunch at Collin's Grill, but he had canceled last minute. Estelle had not informed George of her meeting with Albee Spencer; she had never thought about it, honestly, except that there might be something about the Red Cross article that had come to his attention. She had rolled the appointment into a round of errands to run and as she slowly gained a sense of herself once more, she pulled a to-do list from her purse.

It was difficult to concentrate. A reporter! Women were performing all sorts of jobs they hadn't considered prior to the war, but a reporter! She walked slowly down Carolina, then crossed at the corner of Ellis and Montgomery. Her mind played with the idea. She could manage it, she thought. She could have Louisa in when she was needed, and for the evening events. . . . Hazel would be asleep, so there was no difficulty there. If she were being honest, she had always prided herself on her writing. Even at Smith her papers had received fulsome attention from the professors. Now Albee Spencer had singled her out as a potential journalist. It was gratifying, she admitted, even if it seemed to lead nowhere. It would be dull work, she imagined. School board meetings, and town budget hearings . . . George met often with zoning boards and the like, and he always came back incensed at the bureaucratic sludge he encountered. To cover those proceedings, Estelle reflected, would be tedious in the extreme. But it would be work, honest work, and for the first time in months she felt that her life had not ended upon giving birth. She
loved
Hazel, that was indisputable, but were the rest of her days meant to be spent supporting George in his endeavors and drinking at the Duck Pond and tending to Hazel? It was wonderful to be a mother, the highest station a woman could set for herself, but if it meant so much, why did she feel such a thrill at being asked to report for the
Bugle
?

She had been paying little attention to where she was walking, and when she looked up she found herself nearly in front of Mr. Kamal's flower shop. The front had been redone, but its style was unmistakably Mr. Kamal's. If she had paused to think, she would have turned away, but she felt so much under the influence of her recent conversation with Albee Spencer that she simply opened the door to Mr. Kamal's shop and stepped inside. The scent of flowers assailed her; she smelled roses and something deep and green. The shop looked prosperous. A young woman stood behind the counter; someone had added a bright parrot to the interior. The bird was in the process of climbing up a branch in the center of its cage, and Estelle marveled at the ingenious way it used its beak to steady itself. It made a short ratchet sound, and the young woman—she was an Indian woman, quite beautiful, with a tiny dot in the center of her forehead—shushed it and came around the counter.

“May I help you?” the woman asked.

She possessed the same unusual intonations used by Mr. Kamal.

“I was just passing by and I realized I hadn't seen Mr. Kamal in such a long time. . . .”

“He is in the back resting. I'll call him.”

“Oh, please don't. It's nothing important. He's not ill, is he?”

“No, just lazy!” the woman said, and smiled. “He was up late last night with a sick child. Our apologies.”

“The store looks wonderful. You've made changes.”

“What is your name?” the woman asked. “I'll tell him you stopped by.”

“Estelle Samuels.”

“Very good, Mrs. Samuels. I'll be sure to tell him. Are you positive I can't be of service?”

“No, thank you. I was just running errands.”

“Feel free to look around.”

The parrot emitted another squawk. Estelle smiled and thanked the woman again, then she hurried out the door. She must get hold of herself, she thought. She turned right and walked toward Anderson's Bakery. She needed to sit and collect herself. Who was that woman, she wondered, and what was she doing in the flower shop? And a child? Could that have been their child? No other explanation quite fit the facts, at least not initially, but Estelle felt too muddyheaded to make sense of anything. She needed to stop acting impulsively. She would have coffee and perhaps write a letter to Collie. There was so much to tell, so much to relate. The world was a very funny place.

Chapter Twenty-five

E
stelle held Hazel in her arms while the operator tried to put her through to New Hampshire. Stark, New Hampshire. The operator had made her repeat the name twice, unable to locate it, and she had finally been forced to go to a supervisor who took it as a challenge. Now Estelle waited. It was only a little past seven in the morning and the nursery was quiet and soft, the way she most loved it, and her baby nuzzled her and cooed. Hazel had taken her bottle and now occasionally rubbed her eyes in sleepiness. Estelle kissed the top of Hazel's head and smiled at the gentle softness returned to her by the infant.

Then the phone clicked several times and finally the operator—the supervisor, Estelle realized—came on and said, “Go ahead. Your party is there,” and Collie came on from the New Hampshire side.

“Estelle? Estelle? Is that you?”

“Collie? Sweetheart, I received your letter yesterday. I would have called last night, but it was too late and I feared I'd wake the whole boardinghouse,” Estelle said. “You have me scared, Collie. What's going on there?”

“I'm going to marry him. I'm going to be with him. I don't care anymore.”

“But how? How could you possibly? I know you have strong feelings for him, but how will you manage it?”

Collie's voice grew very quiet. She whispered.

“He's going to Canada. We'll live there. It's the only way. We've worked it out. We leave letters for each other near a post where the horses are kept. We've made plans. We've promised each other.”

“When will you go?” she asked, trying to take it all in.

“I can't tell you that. But soon. Very soon.”

“It's dangerous, though, Collie. It's very dangerous, isn't it? It must be.”

“Yes, it is,” Collie answered, her phone hitting against something. “Dreadfully so. By law, they can hang an escaped prisoner in a time of war. It's treasonous to help him.”

“Can't you wait? Can't he return to Austria and then work his way back to you? Your letter wasn't clear. . . .”

“They're not going back to Germany or Austria. They're going to forced labor camps in Britain. My father hasn't entirely confirmed it, but he won't deny it, either. There's massive work to be done in London . . . all over the United Kingdom, really. The bombing left the country decimated.”

“Collie, I'm worried for you.”

“Do you think I'm making a mistake? Tell me honestly. I have no one to confide in about this. It's so enormous I can't get my head around it.”

Estelle felt every word she had ever spoken freeze in her throat. What did she know? What did she know about anything? She had married for convenience, for reliability, for social standing. How could she possibly render an opinion on Collie's reckless plan? Of course it was wild and perhaps even doomed, but how did that compare to her own stolid life with George? Could she advise her dear friend to ignore every impulse, every warm current of her body, so that she could someday marry a man like George?

She shook her head and kissed the top of her baby's skull.

“You are not making a mistake, darling,” she whispered. “You are not. I can't speak to the safety of your plan, but cling to him. Stay with him.”

“I will. I promise.”

Then Collie stopped. Estelle heard her crying.

“My heart feels like it might burst,” Collie whispered between deep breaths. “I love him so.”

“I know you do. You have loved him from the start.”

“I don't know what will happen, but plenty of brides have lost their men to the war. I'm not alone, heaven knows . . . not in that. So really I've decided to love him as much as I can for as long as I can. Do you think I've made the wrong choice?”

“No,” Estelle said, kissing the baby again, her heart splintered and jagged. “You have made the perfect choice. You have made the only choice. I admire you so much for your choice, Collie. I want you to know that.”

“I don't feel it was a choice. Not really.”

Estelle walked the baby and switched arms. She pinched the phone between her ear and shoulder.

“What about Henry? Is he in the picture at all?”

“I've gone out with him twice more. Really, it's to keep people from spying too much into my business. Henry's a good man, but he's not for me. He knows it deep down, but he doesn't like to examine it too closely.”

“Stay away from Amos. Don't let him get wind of your plans.”

“No, I won't,” Collie said, then her voice changed into a reedy whisper, lighter even than what it had been previously. “Estelle, August is leaving any day. He hasn't told me when, but I know it must be soon. He has his plan made. He says he's simply going to walk away from the war.”

“Do you think he can pull it off? Oh, Collie, he's risking his life to be with you.”

“I don't know. He can get away, certainly, but I don't know if he can make it to Canada. There are so many eyes watching.”

“What about your father? What will he say?”

“He will be disappointed. He will know I had an idea about the escape. But Estelle, we have a right to some happiness, don't we? Doesn't everyone have that right? The war is over, or nearly so. In some ways, this has nothing to do with my father. This is August's life. He has to do what he thinks he should do, and so do I. We only want each other.”

“That's not much to ask of the world, is it?”

“I hope it's not too much.”

Hazel squirmed in Estelle's arms and emitted a small cry.

“Is Hazel right there with you?” Collie asked. “How are you, Estelle? Tell me how you are. I've been so involved in my own dilemma that I haven't even asked.”

“Hazel is right here saying hello. I'm doing fine. I'm doing those silly articles for the newspaper job I mentioned. Hazel is just wonderful. Nothing momentous is going on, I promise. George is nearly done selling his properties out here. He's done very well for himself.”

“Good old George.”

“Yes, good old George. He should be coming downstairs any minute, so I should hop off. Okay now, darling, I'm sending you all my love. I wish I were as brave as you. You are very, very brave.”

“Good-bye, Estelle. Let's see each other soon.”

Then for a moment neither of them said a word. Estelle felt her eyes fill with water again.

“It will be all right,” Estelle whispered. “You were meant to be with him.”

“I hope so,” Collie said, and then whispered good-bye.

Estelle carried Hazel to the window and looked out at the street traffic slowly coming awake.

 • • • 

Collie took the train to Berlin. She needed to get away from camp and she also needed to withdraw her savings. It wasn't much—a little over one hundred dollars—but it was the best she could do. She would give it to August. Whether she went with him or not, whether he could escape on his own or go with Gerhard, he would need money. She could do that much, though even that set her against her father. She hated her position. She hated deceiving, or working in any way against her father's role at the camp. But she felt, at least as the train moved gently through the springtime forests, that she served a higher cause than her loyalty to her father.

As soon as she arrived in Berlin she made her way to the Narragansett Savings Bank. It was the bank everyone used, and she was relieved when she approached a teller without seeing anyone she knew. She asked him for a withdrawal slip and filled it out, requesting the entire amount save five dollars to keep the account open. The teller, a short, bald man with thick glasses, made no comment nor displayed any interest in her transaction beyond the routine of digging out the money from his cash drawer. He counted it out on the counter between them, then nodded at her.

“Anything else?” he asked when she did not immediately pick up the money.

“No, no thank you,” she said, flummoxed by the ease with which she could begin her duplicity.

“Is it looking like rain after all?” the teller asked. “I heard a report that says we're due for it.”

“Just a little overcast, I think,” she said. “It may rain later.”

She gathered the money and put the bills inside a small wallet, then dropped it into her purse. Her heart and pulse hammered with ridiculous weight. She was not cut out to be a spy, or an undercover operator, clearly. She tucked the purse onto her arm and began to turn away when she spotted Henry making his way toward her.

“Now this is a pleasant surprise,” he said. “But why didn't you let me know you were coming to Berlin today? I would have met you at the train.”

“I wasn't sure of my plans. And when I did . . .”

“Well, no matter,” he said. “I'm headed to lunch. Would you join me? It's close enough to noon, I think.”

She tried to invent a way to put him off, but her mind felt empty. Truly she was not very good at subterfuge. She smiled and tucked her elbow closer over her purse. She found herself nodding before she had made up her mind consciously.

“If it's short,” she said. “You're very kind to offer, but I have a dozen errands to run.”

“Just a quick bite. Let me do a little banking here, and then we can stop in at Wentworth's. Have you been before? It's a workingman's saloon, really, but they make the best stew in the area. I insist you try a bowl.”

As he talked, he handed papers and checks to the teller. The teller did not even ask what to do, apparently accustomed to Henry's transactions. He stamped a number of the documents, made out slips, and in good order handed back a small bundle to Henry, which he slipped into the breast pocket of his overcoat.

“There you are, sir,” the teller said. “Have a lovely afternoon.”

“I plan to,” Henry said, then put his hand out to escort Collie forward.

Although it had felt like bad luck at first to run into Henry, Collie realized it served a purpose. If her visit to Berlin aroused any curiosity, she could say she had lunched with Henry. Besides, it gave her a moment to think. She kept her elbow on her purse as she walked beside him to Wentworth's. She jumped slightly when the bell on the door jingled as she pushed through. The restaurant was exactly as Henry had described it: it was a saloon, complete with red-and-white-checked tablecloths and an enormous bar with beer taps rising like masts from its center deck. It was crowded, too, with loggers and workmen. A coal stove burned in the fireplace. Its heat was welcome.

“We'll be with you in a second,” a waitress said to them. “Grab a seat if one opens.”

“That's Hermione,” Henry whispered over the crowd noise, “she's quite famous. She killed her husband with a pickax one winter night. The court decided he deserved it and only sentenced her to three years.”

“I'll be certain not to offend her, then.”

“That's the plan . . . ,” he said, and then touched the small of her back when a table opened just past the front window. Two loggers had occupied the table, and they left it with a nod.

“There you are, governor,” one the men said. “For you and your bird.”

“Thank you,” Henry said.

They sat and waited while Hermione came over and cleared the logger's dishes. She worked efficiently and piled everything onto a tray before lifting it up to her shoulder. Collie found her fascinating. She had thick arms and rusty-colored hair, but she moved with great assurance and unquestionably ruled the dining room. Collie would have liked to ask her a few questions about what it meant for a woman to overturn convention, but that was impossible.

“Will you have the stew?” Henry asked. “I don't mean to push it on you, but it's famous. They make it fresh every day.”

“I'd love a bowl.”

“And what to drink? Is it too early in the day for a cocktail?”

“I think just coffee for me, thanks.”

“I guess that's a better idea. Coffee, then,” he said, catching Hermione in passing. “And two bowls of stew, please.”