The Spirit Room (41 page)

“
Did you want me to work today?” Clara asked.

“
Hello, Clara.” She took a handkerchief from her pocket and daubed at her nose. “No, no, dear. I am taking advantage of the snowstorm to visit with Emma. We’re going to sit by the fire and not do a thing all morning except gossip and drink tea.”

Tarnal
strange, thought Clara. The women barely knew each other and certainly weren’t friends. Clara couldn’t remember Mrs. Beattie ever being at Mrs. Purcell’s house since they had lived there and Mrs. Purcell had never said anything about going to Mrs. Beattie’s. And the women never asked after one another either.

Mrs. Purcell’s gray eyes fluttered as she took Mrs. Beattie’s red cape from her and hung it by the door. “Your father and Euphora are outside waiting for you with the sleigh. The mare is that huge dapple, Duchess. You know the one. You’ve seen her around town.”

Clara said farewell to the women, picked up Mamma’s old cape, and stepped outside into the cold. Billy was on the front porch, hands tucked under his arms, black visor cap pulled down low over his forehead. Out on the street Papa was holding the dapple’s reins and Euphora was standing up in the sleigh. The snow was more than knee deep.

“
Clara, the plow and two work horses just went up Main!” Euphora pointed to the south. “Papa says we can follow them up that way past the Hobart Free College.”

Clara looked at Billy. “You going?”

“
I’m never going anywhere with him ever again.”

“
Come on, Bill. You can sit with me in the back.”

His jaw was set hard. “No. Don’t ask me. I’m never going anywhere with him again. No matter what.”

His face was closed up tight like storm shutters. It would be useless to try and convince him. Whenever he closed off to Papa like this, she had always wanted to shake him out of it, get him to see Papa didn’t mean what he said, get him to believe Papa couldn’t help himself. But now it was different. She didn’t want to change Billy’s mind. She was like her twin now. She had her own storm shutters.

“
I understand.”

“
He’s up to somethin’. He doesn’t go out and get a horse and sleigh for nothing.”

She gazed across the perfect white blanket of snow, broken only by the furrowed path from the street to the front steps. Papa was chatting at the mare and fussing with the harness.

“
You’re probably right.”

On the sleigh ride, Clara was cold and crabby, although it was a glorious ride for Euphora who sat in between her and Papa up on the driver’s seat. Euphora beamed like the sun, her buckteeth chattering, her laughter bursting out at her own jokes. She made up stories about the horse, about their journey. She announced they were going twenty miles to see an old Seneca Indian Chief. Papa played along, adding that the blizzard was still ongoing and they had to carry on even though they couldn’t see through the blinding white, but they told the dapple mare what they needed to do and she’d get them through to the Indian village.

The more Papa and Euphora laughed, the more Clara slumped down on the seat. After a while, the wind gnawed at her so badly that she couldn’t stop shivering. Finally she insisted Papa stop the sleigh and she crawled into the back and huddled down low underneath the bluster. She wanted nothing but the end of the sleigh ride to come, to get home and sit by a fire.

<><><>

LATER THAT AFTERNOON, Clara napped and dreamt in Mamma’s rocker by the fire in the Blue Room. Papa called to her and woke her. She was still crabby and longed to stay asleep, but she rose anyway and staggered into his bedchamber. Standing at his chest of drawers in greatcoat and wool hat, he picked up a few papers, a money clip full with bank notes, and a small pocketknife and stuffed them into his various pockets.

She plopped down in his Windsor chair by the rear window while he poured himself a whiskey and swigged it down. It was getting dark out.

“
That ride was dandy.” He took out his watch from his waistcoat and checked the time. “Got somethin’ new for us.”

Billy’d been right as rain. Papa was about to lay out whatever the sleigh ride was for. He paced over to his washstand, then studying himself in the small round mirror perched on the shelf above the basin, he picked up his comb and ran it through his hair, then his sideburns and beard. When he was satisfied, he tapped the comb on the washstand three times, then came and stood near her.

“
There’s a man name of Reilly. John Reilly. You know him? Came to a spirit circle long while back.”

Clara pictured him, long brown hair over the back of his collar, bald at the top of his head, a hefty paunch. She nodded. Papa went and poured himself another whiskey and brought it to the bed where he sat and faced her.

“
He’s got that Implement Factory on Lewis Street. A real business man.” He swigged from his glass. “I met him over at Minnie’s the other night, you know, the place where you met Sam that time? We got to talkin’.”

“
What were you doing there?”

“
Awh, just playin’ cards downstairs with some fellas and Reilly was there and he was sayin’ that young women were what pleased him most and that Minnie wasn’t young and her two other gals weren’t young and sometimes he had to go all the way up to Rochester to find a young enough gal for his tastes.” Watching her closely, he took another swig of whiskey, then perched the glass on his knee.

Hell-fire
. He was going to set her up with bald Reilly who liked young women. Trembling, she leapt from the chair and flew at him. She was about to strangle him, but instead she snatched his whiskey glass and threw it hard across the room. It shattered against the door and fell into a mess of shards on the floor.

“
No, Papa. No more!”

He shot up, grabbed her wrist. “Sit down and calm down.” He forced her back down into the chair. “I was hopin’ you’d hear me out. You can have more money from this one.”

Her skin burned under his grip. “I don’t want that money, Papa. You can’t make me take that money. I don’t know him.” She wrenched her arm from him, then started for the Blue Room.

He caught her by the arm and yanked her back. “Stay put.” He plunged her down into the chair again.

Her head whacked hard against the wood and smarted. His gray eyes were bulging just the way they did with Billy. She didn’t move.

He was breathing hard, giving her the evil eye, but then his eyes softened. “Please, Little Plum, don’t make me behave like this with you. I ain’t never been mean with you.” He squatted in front of her and put his hands on the chair arms, making a kind of gate around her. “This will be easier than cherry pie. You can have half of whatever we charge Reilly. Think of it. I bet we’ll get five dollars from him every time.”

Tears swelled in her eyes, then flooded down her face.
Every time. Every time
. Papa hated her. He actually hated her. She wasn’t good enough for him to love, only good enough to make filthy money off of.

“
Sam Weston is one thing, Papa. I abhor him, but he admires me. Why do you want me to go with a man we don’t even know?”

“
There, there, Little Plum. It ain’t so bad as that.” He took a handkerchief from his waistcoat and offered it to her.

“
Why do you hate me, Papa? Am I so awful?”

A sharp knock rapped at the hallway door. “Is everything all right in there?” It was Mrs. Purcell, her voice high and shaky.

Papa bounded for the door. Opening it just a peep, he lodged himself so she couldn’t see in.

“
I apologize for the ruckus, Emma. I had an accident and me and Clara’re cleanin’ it up.”

“
Clara, are you all right?” Mrs. Purcell asked.

Papa glared at Clara across the room.

“
Yes, ma’am.”

Papa nodded at Mrs. Purcell, then closed the door before she could get in another word. “She’s too much of a busy body for us,” he said as he headed across the room to her. “We’re goin’ to move out of here in a few months. I’ve got great plans for us, Little Plum.” He patted the top of her head. She felt the urge to bite his hand like a mean old dog would, but stopped herself.

“
We’ll talk more about Reilly tomorrow. But you’ll see. It’ll be the easiest money we ever made, much easier than Sam. Go on now and tell your little sister everything is all right. You know how nervous she gets when I get loud. She’s probably in there quiverin’. Now, tomorrow, I’m takin’ you to the dress shop.” He took a new pair of black leather gloves out of his coat pockets and put one on. “We’re gettin’ you a true lady’s dress and one of them hoop things you been wantin’. Shoes too. Here.” He pulled on the other glove, collected the hand towel from his washstand and brought it to her. “Finish wipin’ your face and go tell Euphora nothin’s wrong.”

While she dried her tears away, he rambled on about how everything would be all right and he’d take care of things and they’d have more money and they could move out of Mrs. Purcell’s. When she was finished with the towel, she flung it down at the floor, rose, and left without looking at him.

<><><>

THE NEXT FEW DAYS, Papa hammered and hammered on about John Reilly. He told her the same things over and over just the way he did before she started with Sam. First, if she wouldn’t go along with him, he might hurt Billy. Second, if she couldn’t help the family with their needs, he’d have to leave them all and go looking for gold at Pike’s Peak in Colorado, and third, she was his only hope, his pride and joy. After three days of it, Clara was worn down and agreed to meet John Reilly at the Spirit Room. She couldn’t think of any other way to appease Papa.

The moment she gave in, Papa got her the new green taffeta dress he had promised, a whalebone hoop, new shiny boots with buttons, and some face paint. Mrs. Purcell didn’t have a big mirror anywhere in the house for her to see herself. “They’re just tools of vanity,” she had told Clara. Vanity or not, she longed to see herself, so before she was to meet with Reilly, she decided she’d go into Mrs. Beattie’s shop and see herself in the milliner’s full-length mirror.

Just as she was rubbing a tiny bit of red paint onto her lips and getting ready to leave, Billy came into the Blue Room covered with grime from working at Maxwell’s.

“
What did you have to do to get that dress?” he asked.

Clara stiffened. In her hand mirror, she saw herself blush. Did he know something?

“
Papa’s doing well on one of his ventures. That’s all.”

“
That can’t be all. If he’s doing so good, why isn’t he giving things to me and Euphora? I need boots.” He raised his foot backward as though he was about to get shod. There was a hole the size of a silver dollar on one of the soles. “I found a piece of Indian rubber at Maxwell’s. They let me have it so I stuck it in here.” He stomped his boot down. “Why is he always giving you new fancy things?”

“
I don’t know. Maybe he is trying to find me a good husband. Did you ever think of that?” She hated lying to Billy. It made her sick. Everything she said all day long was a lie and every lie made her feel split in two like a log under the whack of an axe. There was one real Clara inside who knew what the truth was, and another Clara—the liar, the one everyone else knew.

He squinted at her. “He’s got you up to something, or he’s about to, and it ain’t just a husband. You can get that on your own. Watch out for him, Clara.”

“
I will.”

Bending over the washbasin, sandy hair flopping down, Billy splashed his face with the murky water. Would there ever come a day again when she wasn’t lying? She offered him a towel. Only if she got away from Papa. Only then could she stop the lying.

Papa appeared in the door of the Blue Room. “You look just like your grandmother, Elsie, a real beauty. You ready?”

“
Watch out, Clara,” Billy said.

Papa gave him a nasty look, so Clara led Papa out of the house quickly. It was a raw, gloomy afternoon. Papa was babbling about the house they were going to get when they moved out of Mrs. Purcell’s, but she wasn’t paying much attention to him.

Since it was the first time with Reilly, Papa promised to wait outside the Spirit Room. If anything went wrong, she was to call out fast and loud. Papa’d be right there in the stairwell, down at the street door, close enough to hear her, but far enough away for her and Reilly to have privacy. When she asked him what could go more wrong than what he was already making her do, he said, “Men’re unpredictable sometimes. It’s their nature. I’ve heard stories. That’s all. I’m gonna be right nearby if you need me.” She bit down on the inside of her mouth until it hurt. When she pressed him about what unpredictable things he’d heard, he just said, “Never mind.”

She tore at a fingernail. Reilly better not be one of the unpredictable ones, she thought.

Papa waited in the street while she dashed into Mrs. Beattie’s to look in the full-length mirror. Mrs. Beattie was busy flattering a fat woman who was trying on a purple velvet bonnet. Clara swept by the two women on her way to the mirror. It took her a few seconds to recognize herself. It was like the feeling she got when they first arrived in Geneva and she’d wake up in the new bed and wonder if they were in their shack in Homer or in a barn loft on the road to New York State, or in a dream. She blinked and stared. What she saw was a young grown up lady with sad brown eyes. She blinked three more times, and then Mrs. Beattie appeared behind her looking over her shoulder.