Probably because she was a woman, he’d never applied the same rules to Aster.
Just as well. Things were complicated enough, as it was.
“Good house tonight,” murmured one of the relief dealers, just coming on duty. “Looks like that little ruckus earlier settled things down some.”
Galen nodded. “Keep an eye on the table by the door. Young Blakely’s got a snootful.”
“Sure will,” the young man replied, and Galen watched him snake his way between tables and wondered if he was single.
Back to Katy again. He knew damned well what he was doing. It wasn’t going to work. If he’d lined her up with a husband right off the bat, it might have worked out. Now it was too late. He might try to convince himself it was still an option, but Galen knew he would never let her go.
He didn’t know what he was going to do with her—hell, the last thing he needed was a wife—but he knew she was his.
*
Long after Ila had slipped in with two mugs of hot cocoa and an offer to look after Tara and keep her out of Aster’s sight until Katy could find them another place to stay, Katy lay awake, going over the past few hours in her mind.
She’d made a few colossal blunders in her life, but never one as big as this. Back home they’d had a roof of their own, a tiny plot of dirt where they could grow a few turnips, potatoes, and cabbages. She could have gone on the same way for years until Tara was grown and married. She might even have found someone for herself, eventually.
But oh, no, they’d had to come to America, land of opportunity. Land of lovely green tablecloths, where gold rained down from the sky. The trouble with dreams was that sooner or later, a body woke up.
Tara was up to something, Katy knew the signs.
She closed her eyes and tried to block out the sound of laughter down in the pump room below, the muffled rumble from the gaming rooms overhead, and the smell of mildew and paint in the stuffy little locker room.
After a white, she drifted into a dream. Familiar faces, familiar voices . . . but not familiar, after all. Deep blue eyes, smiling eyes, a cap of curly hair the color of tarnished brass, with a streak of white running through it . . . and a pair of short, curved horns.
Someone was laughing. She was shouting, but no one would listen, they just kept laughing and laughing. Lips moving in her sleep, she tossed and muttered until Tara roused and punched her in the back.
“Go to sleep, Katy, it’s nearly morning.”
So she slept again, and this time she dreamed of a monstrous deep tunnel. She’d fallen and was sliding down a rough rocky surface, going faster and faster while someone who looked like Galen McKnight stood by, laughing, until darkness swallowed her up.
*
Tara was sluggish as always the next morning. Katy was at her wit’s end when Ila tapped softly on the door with a tray of coffee and a basket of mending.
“Oh, heavens, I’ve overslept again. Tara, wake up, we’ll have to hurry.”
“You go along, honey, and leave your sister to me. Miss Aster’s gone shopping for new curtains. She’ll not be home for hours.”
With a harried smile and a sense of guilt, Katy rushed through her dressing, sipping Willy’s strong, scalding brew between buttoning herself into her gray muslin and lacing up her shoes. A few minutes later, she dashed down the gangplank just as the courthouse clock struck the hour.
“Merciful saints, she’ll murder me.”
“Just in time, I see,” someone called out.
With one hand on her purse, the other holding on to her hat, she glanced up to see Captain Bellfort in a shiny black motor car. “If you’re daring enough, I’ll drive you into town,” he offered.
Daring was the last thing she felt, but she desperately needed whatever it took to keep her from being late again.
Katy had never set foot in a motor car before, hadn’t even seen more than a few of the noisy contraptions, but such was her distracted state of mind that she climbed in without a thought to her bodily safety.
“Captain Bellfort—”
“Jack.”
She took a deep breath and started again. “Jack, then, and thank you for the privilege. Jack, would you happen to know of a cheap, respectable boardinghouse where I might find a room for Tara and me?”
“Leaving the Queen’s hospitality so soon? Now, why am I not surprised? Could it be that McKnight’s famous charm is finally beginning to wear thin?”
Oh, for heaven’s sake, Galen McKnight’s charm had nothing to do with the matter. She barely managed to keep from saying so. She hadn’t so many friends she could afford to squander a single one.
Before she could frame a reply, however, the captain came back with a proposition that knocked the wind clean out of her sails.
Chapter Thirteen
“Sure you won’t change your mind and come and work for me, Katy?” She stared at him wordlessly. Laughter lurked in those dark eyes of his, as if he didn’t seriously expect her to take him up on the offer. “And how much would you be offering me if I said I would?” she probed cautiously.
“How much are you worth?”
Katy hadn’t the slightest idea of how much a real singer was worth, not that she would even consider doing such a thing. She sang the way everyone in Skerrie Head sang. For the joy of it. Because there were songs to be sung.
He watched her expectantly. “Two dollars a night,” she replied. There. That should put an end to his teasing.
“Shall we say eight?”
Her jaw dropped. “Eight . . . what?”
Eight songs, she thought. Two dollars for the mere singing of eight songs. “The Cobbler” and “Barbara Allen.” “Maggie Pickens” and “The Month of January,” and—
It would be thievery, pure and simple. She knew hundreds of songs, and sang them every one for the pleasure of it.
“Eight dollars a performance. I provide the costumes, accompaniment, plus room and board. In exchange you’ll do two sessions a night, possibly more on cruise nights.”
Even if she could have made her tongue work properly, Katy couldn’t have found the wind to reply. “Eight dollars a night? And room and board for us both?” she managed finally.
The captain touched his collar. His eyes went all lazy, and Katy told herself it wasn’t disappointment she was feeling. She’d known all along he was only teasing her.
But then he began to chuckle. “Ah, you mean your sister. Yes, of course. A room and meals for the both of you, plus a starting salary of eight dollars a night.”
“But it’s far too much.”
“We’ll see, Katy, my love. We’ll see. I have a feeling we’re going to get along just fine, but first, here we are. I suppose you’d better go in and tell Inez you won’t be her slave any longer.”
*
She thought about it. Eight dollars a night, plus room and board for two. All morning she ironed and swept up scraps around the cutting table, put away spools and bolts and cards of trim. And she hummed under her breath.
You’re a fool, Katy O’Sullivan. A fair lilter you may be back home where you’re among folks who’ve known you since you were cradle-bound, but it’s a fool you are in America.
Nevertheless, she hummed while she worked. While the three seamstresses clattered away on their machines, raising their voices to pass back and forth snippets of gossip, Katy sang snatches of “Amhram Dochais” and “Sean Dun Na Ngall.” She hummed “Lark in the Morning” and “Rocking the Cradle,” songs she’d known all her life.
Eight dollars a night.
Why that was almost as much as she’d been promised for a week of working from seven in the morning until six in the evening for Mrs. Baggot.
Steam drifted up from the heavy electric iron, causing her hair to curl around her face, bring a flush to her cheeks and a film of sweat everywhere else.
Twelve dollars a week added to eight dollars a night—
Mercy. At that rate she’d be out of debt in no time. She’d be able to pay off her debts and se
t aside enough to rent her a shop. Nothing fancy. Two rooms was all she would need. With a window. She could see it now, her name in modest gold letters on the door. Miss Katy’s, with curlicues on the M and the K. Or perhaps, Miss O’Sullivan’s.
Miss O’Sullivan’s what? Dress Shop? Clothing Emporium? She wasn’t entirely sure what an emporium was, but it sounded big and proud and important.
With a look of dawning delight, she whispered, “Miss O’Sullivan’s House of Fine Fashions. Yes!”
It was perfect. Of course, it would take a door as big as a barn to hold it all, but she could sort out the details later.
Finally, finally, she was on her way! Impulsively, she plopped the iron onto the board, hoisted her skirts above her ankles, and jigged a few impromptu steps around a dress form, grinning from ear to ear. Grinning like a possum, as Willy would say. Whatever a possum was, it couldn’t be any happier than she was.
“Miss O’Sullivan!”
Oops. “Yes, ma’am?” The stench of scorched linen drifted up to her nostrils. With a stricken look, she hurriedly reached for the iron, knocked it over, but caught it before it could fall to the floor.
Inez Baggot stood in the workroom doorway, black eyes snapping fire. All three seamstresses turned to watch. The only sound in the room was a tiny whimper from Katy. She gripped her right wrist to keep the pain from shooting all the way up to her shoulder. It didn’t help.
“This will cost you dearly.” The veiled threat was all the more terrifying for being softly spoken.
Between stark terror and the agony of a blistered palm, it was all Katy could do to defend herself. “But it’s only a single panel, ma’am. I can soak it in lemon juice and set it out in the sun, and—”
“I don’t sell damaged goods. If there’s not enough linen left on the bolt to cut a new section, you’ll pay for the entire thing. Otherwise, I’ll only dock you for what it takes to recut the panel. Now, see to it. And when you’re done with that, you can go next door and wash down the walls and scrub the floor. There’s men coming tomorrow to paint and put down carpet.”
“Next door’?”
“Are you hard of hearing? I announced in the paper last week that I was expanding my showroom. Now, go see if there’s enough material left on the bolt. if there is, set it out on the table with Miss Eppie’s pattern, and then go fetch a bucket and pail and get to cleaning.”
Katy refused to cry. It wasn’t the first time she’d had to ignore a burn. Back when her mother died, when she was twelve, and she’d had the cooking and washing to do for Tara and Da, she’d blistered herself more than once before learning to use her apron to drag a pot off the fire.
*
Following her own long shadow, Katy made her way slowly back to the waterfront that evening, blind to the splendor of a setting sun reflected on the mirrorlike surface of the river.
A motor car rattled noisily past, causing two horses to whinny and cavort. She didn’t bother to look around. If it happened to be Captain Bellfort, and if he happened to smile and say something nice to her, she just might break down and cry her eyes out, she was that miserable.
Thank goodness she wouldn’t have to sing for her supper tonight. She could hardly remember a time when she’d felt less like singing. Captain Bellfort had promised to give her until the weekend to get settled and go over a few bits of music with his pianist.
At least there was no crowd gathered on deck when she stepped aboard the Queen. Two well-dressed gentlemen followed her up the gangplank. When one of them tipped his hat and held the door, she managed a weary smile, but it took nearly all the strength she possessed.
“Thank you, sir,” she murmured.
“My pleasure, miss.”
The small kindness brought ready tears stinging to the surface. Katy fought them back, bracing herself for what lay ahead. There was no sign of Tara, which was good.
Or perhaps not.
Telling herself it was folly to borrow trouble, she hurried down the stairs and turned toward the hastily furnished locker room. She didn’t see a single soul along the way, but heard the sound of laughter coming from the galley at the other end of the corridor.
Tara would be having her supper, or lingering to help wash up afterward. Willy had promised to keep her busy and out of trouble.
Carefully, Katy unpinned her hat, smoothed the modest ribbon band, and placed it on top of her trunk. Absently, she brushed at a speck of lint on her skirt, and gasped as pain streaked up from her blistered palm.
She allowed herself three deep breaths, and then stiffened her shoulders. There was Tara to find, and packing to do, but before she could use her hand, she’d better beg a bit of butter or tallow from Willy. She had tied her handkerchief around her hand when she’d finished scrubbing, hoping it might ease the pain.
It hadn’t. She didn’t know which hurt more, the streak of raw blisters across her palm, or her aching feet. Except for the time she’d spent on her knees, scrubbing years of filth from a splintery floor, she’d been on her feet all day long.
Without thinking, she sank down onto the stool in the corner. She leaned back against the wall and allowed her eyelids to close. Just for a minute. A single minute . . .
*
“Katy, wake up, wake up! Can you hear me? I know I promised, but this time, it’s important!” Tara was shaking her shoulder, going on and on about . . . sickness? Something about a roomful of desperately ill people?
“They were all moaning and groaning and throwing up in buckets, just like on the boat coming over, only it was right here. It was Charlie and Ava and Johnny the Knife and Oscar. It’s the cholera, Katy, I’m sure of it. Please, please wake up—we have to warn the captain.”
“Shhh, go ‘way,” Katy murmured, certain she must be dreaming.
“But, Katy, I saw it!”
Without opening her eyes, Katy said, “There’s no cholera here. They have rules about such things in America.”
“I know, it’s mostly Asia and places like that, but, Katy, I saw it, and it wasn’t one of those foreign places, it was right here. Katy, please open your eyes. What are we going to do?” The child grabbed her hand to pull her up off the stool. Unfortunately, it was her right hand. Katy screamed, Tara jumped back, and then the door burst open and Aster stood, hands on her hips, demanding to know what was going on now.
“I told you you had to leave. Didn’t you think I meant it?”
“Oh, but—” Tara began when Katy waved her to silence. By then she was awake. Wide awake and wishing she were still sleeping.
“We’ve only our packing to do, and that won’t take long. I’m sorry we couldn’t leave sooner, but I just now got back from—”
“I’m warning you, I fully intend to go through your bags before you set one foot off my property. Aren’t those Ila’s pearl earbobs you’re wearing? We’ll just see what she has to say about that.”
Katy could only stare at her. She’d awakened from one nightmare, only to find herself mired in another one.
“Miss Aster, are you feeling all right?”
Aster glared at Tara briefly before turning back to Katy. “There’s nothing wrong with me that getting rid of the pair of you won’t cure. You won’t be coming back again this time, so take that ugly cat of yours with you.”
“Heather’s not ugly, she’s only—Miss Tyler, are you sure you’re not feeling ill? You’re shaking all over and your face is all splotchy.”
Throwing her hands in the air, Aster spun on her heel and marched out, skirttails flying. The door struck the jamb and bounced open again.
“I think she’s coming down with it, Katy,” Tara whispered.
“Stop it. Just stop it right now. I don’t want to hear one more word about cholera, do you understand?”
Tara looked hurt, but then Katy was hurting, too. What’s more, she was mad as a hornet. The woman had all but accused her of being a thief.
Saints preserve us, how could everything go so right and so wrong, all on the same
day? “Gather up everything and pack it away in the valise, we’re leaving. Where’s your clean underwear? Hurry, because I don’t want to walk down the wharf after dark. And don’t forget Heather’s basket.”
“Where are we going?”
Patience, Katy admonished herself. Tara was hardly to blame for Aster’s nastiness, or Katy’s weariness, or her carelessness with the iron. “You’ll never guess. Captain Bellfort has invited us to move aboard his boat and work for him.”
Cholera was forgotten for the moment. Tara brightened, but Katy reminded herself that she wasn’t the only one who was tired. The child was drooping. She’d probably spent the day scrubbing pots for Willy and running errands for Ila.
“There now, doesn’t that sound exciting?” Forcing a cheerful smile, Katy pinned on her hat again, glad there was no mirror in the room to remind her of what she must look like.
Cholera, of all things. It came of reading all those books her mother had brought to her marriage, along with a trunk full of fancy gowns and a service for six in heavy sterling flatware. By the time she died, all that was left were a few gowns that Katy had since cut down and turned until there was little left, and a complete set of encyclopedias. No one in Skerrie Head had wanted the books enough to pay her father’s asking price.
They worked with silent efficiency. Packing everything they possessed hardly took more than a few minutes, and then there was only the trunk to be dealt with. Shoulders sagging as her excitement began to fade, Tara took the cat basket on her arm and went to find someone to haul their trunk up on deck, while Katy took one last look around the room to make sure they hadn’t left anything behind. Not that they had much to leave. Even the kitten’s bowl belonged to Galen.
She would miss Ila. She’d miss Willy, too, and the old man who polished brass and windows, and Oscar, who always had a smile and a cheerful word.
And Galen. She knew very well he expected her to fail, he’d as good as told her so. They both knew she would’ve had to work until the spirit had all gone out of her, sweeping and ironing, scrubbing and polishing for Mrs. Baggot, to pay off all she owed and save enough for her business.
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