The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress (2 page)

Joe
.

Stella sat up and threw her legs over the edge of the bed, toes resting against the cool floorboards. She pushed a tangle of pale curls away from her eyes with a fine-boned hand. Yawned. Then grabbed a blue cotton shift from the floor and pulled it over her tan shoulders. She hadn’t expected her husband to come—hadn’t wanted him to—but there was no mistaking the familiar rumble of that engine. She went out to meet him wearing yesterday’s dress and a contrived grin.

“You’re back.”

Joseph Crater leaned out the open window and drew her in for a kiss. “Drove all night. We beat the Bar Harbor Express by an hour!” He clapped their chauffeur on the back. “We’ll have to paint a racing stripe down the side of this old thing.”

Stella pulled the car door open and saw two things at once: he’d brought her flowers—white peonies, her favorite—and he wasn’t wearing his wedding band. Again. The sight of that naked finger stripped the grin from her face.

Joe climbed out and reached for her with one arm, but she took a small step backward and looked at his pants pocket. The imprint of his
ring pressed round against his cotton trousers. The question that surfaced was not the one she really wanted to ask. “Did you have a pleasant trip?”

He nodded.

“Where did you go?”

Joe’s answer was cautious. “Atlantic City. With William Klein.”

Her voice was even, almost carefree. “Just the two of you?” Joe hesitated long enough for her to rephrase the question. “Were you and William alone?”

He glanced at Fred Kahler, stiff behind the wheel, eyes downcast, and responded with a single sharp word. “
Stell
.”

It took a moment to find her breath. All that fresh air and she couldn’t pull a stitch of it into her lungs. “Must you be so
flagrant
about it?”

“We’ll talk about this later.”

Stella heard the warning in his voice, but didn’t care. She rose up onto the balls of her feet, the gravel digging into her bare skin, as anger ripped through her voice. “We have
nothing
to talk about!”

His eyes went small and dark.

Stella grabbed the car door and, with a rage that startled them both, slammed it shut, crushing Joe’s hand in the frame. She heard the crunch before he screamed, and when he yanked his hand away, two fingers were bloody and mangled.

STELLA
waited for Joe on the deck of the Salt House. It was Belgrade Lakes’ only fine-dining establishment, and they’d been late, thanks to his difficulty dressing with one hand. She had refused to help him.

Joe hadn’t yelled at her after the incident. Hadn’t called her names or lifted a hand to strike her. All he said was, “I’ll need your help with this mess.” Almost polite. Then he soaked his hand in the kitchen sink and waited for her to gather ointment and gauze. She had wrapped the bandage tighter than necessary, angered anew by his cavalier attitude and the way he expected her to accept that a man of his position would have a mistress. As though some skirt on Broadway was the same thing as a membership in the City Club.

By the time they arrived at the restaurant, he’d created a plausible
fiction for his injury. “Had a beastly run-in with a Studebaker,” Joe explained to their waiter, wiggling his fingers for effect. “Damn thing tried to eat my hand for lunch.” And then, shortly after being seated, he excused himself to make a phone call.

Stella ordered their meal from a menu of summer fare: grilled fish, steaks, roasted vegetables, and fruit. A pleasant breeze rolled off the lake, rocking the Chinese lanterns that were strung around the deck. The red-and-yellow globes sent dancing spheres of amber across the linen tablecloths. Only a handful of the tables were occupied, and the diners leaned close over the candles, lost in conversation or in silence as they enjoyed the view. The longer she waited for Joe to return, the more they sent sympathetic glances her way.

The meal arrived with wine and bread, and Stella shifted candles and silverware to make room for the ample dinner. She waited until their server departed with his tray before taking a long drink of merlot. Steam rose from the pan-seared trout with lemon-caper sauce on her plate, and she wondered what sort of mood Joe would be in when he finished his call.

Minutes later, the door banged open on loose hinges, and Stella forced a smile as Joe strode toward the table, shoulders rounded forward like an ox. It was a look Stella knew well. Fury and determination and arrogance.

He yanked his chair away from the table with his good hand. “I’m leaving in the morning.”

“Why?”

“I have to go back to the city tomorrow. Straighten a few things out. I’ll be back on Thursday, in plenty of time for your birthday.”

“But—”

“Don’t snivel. It doesn’t become you.” Joe unfolded the crisp black napkin and spread it over his lap. “You shouldn’t have waited. Food’s getting cold.”

STELLA
stayed in bed when Joe pushed back the covers at six the next morning. She stayed there while he bathed—the water turning on with a groan of rusted pipes—and when his toothbrush tapped against the sink. Stella stayed curled around her
pillow when he rattled through the dresser and yanked his clothes from the closet. Didn’t move when he nudged her shoulder or when he cursed or when he brushed dry lips against her temple—a rote farewell—his freshly shaved chin rubbing against her cheek. Not until she heard his footsteps on the stairs did she open her eyes. And only when the Cadillac roared to life outside did she sit up. Four steps brought her to the window. She wiped his kiss from her temple. “Goodbye.”

The last Stella Crater ever saw of her husband was a glimpse of his shirt collar through the rear window as Fred eased the Cadillac down the gravel driveway.

Chapter Two

ORCHARD STREET, LOWER EAST SIDE, MONDAY, AUGUST 4, 1930

MARIA
and Jude lay in a breathless tangle, watching the sky lighten to the color of ash outside their bedroom window.
Wanton
, he called her, throwing an arm above his head and dragging air deep into his lungs.

Maria pressed closer. “Our marriage is doomed to fail.”

Jude tugged at her earlobe with his teeth and buried his face in her hair, inhaling the scents of lemon peel and lavender. “Why’s that?”

“We are totally incompatible.”

“You’ve been saying that for years.”

Maria’s father considered Jude profane, and her mother interceded daily for his inevitable visit to purgatory, but their different religious beliefs—or his lack thereof—had never been an issue for them. Despite the fact that she’d chosen an agnostic husband over her parents’ objections.

“When the baby comes, we’ll fight.”

Jude moved the sheet away, exposing her flat stomach. He circled her navel with the tip of one finger and then placed his palm on her belly. The hope in her copper-penny eyes was too much for him. He turned away.

“We never fight.”

“But we will. Because I
will
be pregnant. One day.”

“When is your appointment?”

“Fourteen days.” She breathed the words against his skin.

“And you think this doctor can help?”

“It’s a start.”

In the distance they could hear the rumble of the El where Park Row met the Bowery. Jude groaned and pushed the sheet away.

“Don’t.” Her breath was warm against his neck.

“I have to.”

“You should stay.”

“Tell that to the sergeant.”

Maria curled into him and wrapped her leg around his. His pulse throbbed against her thigh. “I could convince you.”

“You could convince the pope to take a mistress.”

“Don’t say that.” Her hands flew over her chest in the sign of the cross. She grabbed her rosary—pale blue beads on a silver chain—from the bedside table and slipped it around her neck. It hung between the swell of her breasts, carnal and reverent.

“It’s true. If Pius the Eleventh saw you right now, he’d reconsider his vow of celibacy.” Jude sat up, reluctant. “I could lose my job.”

“Is that such a bad thing?” She regretted the words as soon as they were out. A shadow crossed his face, and Maria crawled toward him. She slid her hand along his thigh and offered a coy smile. “Consider the alternative,” she whispered.

Jude laughed and dropped back to his elbows. “You’re wicked.”

“Stay there.”

Maria leaned over the bed and reached for something underneath. The heavy silver cross around her neck clanked against the floor as she stretched farther, balanced precariously on her hips. She could feel the heat of his gaze on her spine, could almost sense its caress in the small of her back. Finally, she felt the square edge of the box she’d stashed the night before.

“For you,
Detective
.” She handed him the small brown package.

Jude took the gift and peered at the hastily tied string. “Is that my shoelace?”

“We were out of ribbon.”

“What’s the occasion?”

“I wanted to give it to you back in March, when you got the promotion.” She smiled, embarrassed. “It took a while to save up.”

Too excited to wait for her husband, Maria ripped off the paper and held up a cigarette lighter.

He took it and flipped the lid. A bright orange flame leapt up.

She pointed to the side. “Your initials.”

The letters
J.S
. were engraved across the metal in script and filled with black patina. Jude ran a thumb across them.

“Do you like it?”

Jude cupped the lighter in the palm of his hand. It was warm against his skin. “I love it.”

“Then what’s wrong?” She tapped the sudden crease between his eyebrows.

“You shouldn’t have to work two jobs. It’s not right.”

She pulled away to better see his face. “You know Smithson won’t hire a woman tailor full-time—too big of a hit to his pride. So I’ll keep the housework for now. Besides, we need the money. Rent just went up.”

“Not
again
?”

“The notice came in the mail yesterday.”

Jude sat up and stretched. He looked like a kitten, tongue curled and back arched. She laughed.

“Not so fast.” Maria caught him off balance and tipped him back onto the mattress. She pinned him down with her hands and knees and kissed him with the deep warmth known only to seasoned lovers. He didn’t resist.

MARIA
slipped through the entrance of 40 Fifth Avenue and paused to catch her breath. She twisted her watch around her thin wrist and noted the time. Eight-thirty. She winced and rushed toward the elevator. Her lust and Jude’s shoelaces had made them both late for work, but she could always blame the incessant construction-induced traffic along Fifth Avenue. There were over seven hundred buildings under construction in Manhattan that year, turning her well-laid route into a maze of cracked concrete and cordoned-off streets. It seemed every building, cellar, subway, and foundation was undergoing some sort of alteration to make room for the relentless swell of people. The air was a broken symphony of shovels, rock drills, jackhammers, and cranes pecking, breaking, and thundering New York City into the twentieth century.

Maria wiped a bead of sweat from her upper lip and leaned against the cool wall of the elevator as it rose to the fifth floor. Her uniform, a black rayon dress with lace collar and cuffs, stuck against her back with the humidity and chafed her skin. She fished for the keys to apartment 508 inside her purse, thankful that the owners were on vacation in Maine and wouldn’t know she was late.

She let herself into the apartment and eased the door shut. Four times the size of the efficiency she shared with Jude, the Craters’ home spread before her, wood floors and cream-colored walls dotted with oil paintings in gilded frames. The living room was anchored by a stone fireplace with a stained mantel and a painting that cost more than she made in six months. Mrs. Crater had beamed the day they won the Monet at auction, confiding that it would be worth a small fortune in a few years—not that they hadn’t parted with a decent sum, mind you, but it was a luxury now that Mr. Crater had his seat on the bench. She had shown Maria the signature in the bottom right-hand corner, insisted she trace it with her fingertip to
feel
his name on the painting. They both knew it was the closest Maria would ever come to a Monet.

The rest of the apartment was compact. A small kitchen and dining room were off to the side, an empty pewter fruit bowl and place settings for six on the table. Vacant elegance. Maria stood in the entry and inhaled the smells of oiled furniture and floor wax. The heavy must of velvet drapes. One day she hoped to have a home as lovely. Jude’s promotion brought them a step closer, but the reality was that even if he made sergeant in a few years, they would never be able to afford something like this. She pushed aside a swell of envy and got to work.

The Craters kept the cleaning supplies beneath the cabinet in the guest bathroom, and she was about to collect them when she heard the Victrola playing softly in the master bedroom. Mr. Crater often left it on—a habit that irritated Mrs. Crater to no end—and must have forgotten to turn it off when he left for Maine on Friday evening.

Maria pushed open the dark wood door that led from the living room into the master bedroom. It was furnished, as was the rest of the apartment, thoughtfully and expensively. Sturdy walnut furniture. Red-and-cream bedclothes. Curtains puddled on the floor.

But stretched across the bed was a naked woman, twenty years younger than Mrs. Crater and a great deal more buxom. She and Maria stared at each other for one horrified second. The woman screamed and hurried to cover herself as Joseph Crater emerged from the bathroom, dripping wet, a towel around his waist. Maria gasped an apology and shut the door. She stood, paralyzed, listening to the tumult in the other room.

“The maid,” Crater said.

A whisper. “What is she doing here?”

“Cleaning, obviously.” He tripped over something. Cursed. “I forgot to tell her not to come.”

“You
forgot
?”