An Unexpected Suitor

by Anna Schmidt

  “How large is your summer staff, Nola? Normally, I mean.”

  “Five or six people—two to help in the kitchen, two to serve and one or two to clear and set up the tables.”

  “What a coincidence. I believe Harrison mentioned he was hiring an additional six performers to complement the talent already in residence for the opening of the cabaret.”

  “He didn’t mention a specific number when he inquired about renting my upstairs rooms for his group but yes, I believe that Jonah mentioned there were six.”

  Rachel grinned. “Then it’s perfect. His performers stay here and work in the tearoom for the interim.”

  “That’s not possible, Rachel. People of the theater? I’m already losing local business. If I actually employ actors? And that doesn’t even begin to address the eyebrows that would be raised if I were to house them as well.”

  “Yes, you have a point. On the other hand, it is my understanding that people of the theater are quite used to supplementing their spotty incomes by waiting tables or performing kitchen duty, and it isn’t as if it’s for the entire season.”

  “Even so…”

  “And it would give you the upper hand with Harry. He needs your rooms, Nola. Everything else is booked solid. You can set terms to suit your needs, such as offering the rooms on one condition.”

  “That his performers staff the tearoom for as long as they reside in my upstairs rooms,” Nola murmured.

  “Precisely. It buys you the time you need to secure a more suitable staff.”

  “But what of their rehearsals and.

  “There are twenty-four hours in every day, Nola, and this place is open—what—seven of those hours? Harry is a resourceful man. He can surely figure out a rehearsal schedule around that.”

  “It might just work,” Nola said, warming to the idea as she devoured a slice of melon.

  “Of course it will work and you mustn’t delay. First thing tomorrow you should march yourself over to that office my cousin keeps above McAllister’s store and present the offer. If he has any sense at all, Harry will leap at this opportunity and your problems will be solved as well as his.” Rachel dusted crumbs off her lap and reached for a cluster of grapes. “Now, how else can I improve your day, my dear?”

  The following morning Nola made a detour from her normal routine. She walked to the post office and then she climbed the stairs outside the general store to Starbuck’s office. She saw his bicycle parked in its usual place under the stairway and forced herself to take several deep breaths to calm her nerves at confronting Starbuck on his own territory. After all, up to now, he had always come to the tearoom. Somehow the shift in venue gave Nola pause.

  At the top of the stairs, she knocked lightly on the door. It surprised her that there was no sign or lettering on the frosted glass panel in the door. She would have thought a man like Harry Starbuck would be inclined to exclaim his accomplishments to the stars. She rapped again.

  “He left early this morning for town,” Ian McAllister shouted up at her as he stood on the landing outside the back of his shop below her. For people on the island, town meant the larger community of Nantucket Town. “Said he’d be back by noon.”

  “Thank you,” Nola said and prepared to leave.

  “If you like, you could leave him a note. He never locks up,” Ian said.

  Nola considered the appropriateness of entering the office when Harry was gone. If she left the note, he would come to the tearoom and she could state her case and she would lose no more time. She waved at Ian and stepped inside.

  Harry’s presence was everywhere in the small room. The swivel desk chair was pushed back and turned to one side as if he’d just stepped downstairs for a moment. Next to the window stood a wooden hall tree with four metal hooks. Two held the familiar sack jackets—one a light fawn linen and the other a charcoal serge. On the third hook hung the black woolen scarf he often wore on cooler days, one fringed end thrown casually over his shoulder. And on the very top hook was a straw hat, battered and shaped to the imprint of Harrison Starbuck’s head. But it was his desk that drew her closer, or rather the contents of that desk.

  The first thing she noticed was that everything was in perfect alignment. The blotter was precisely even with the edge of the desk. The lamp centered on the blotter’s back edge stood behind a brass inkwell, a matching tray holding three pens and a letter opener. She wondered why he chose to use the old-fashioned pen and ink rather than the more popular self-filling fountain pen and found it charming that he did.

  To the right was a stack of clean white paper and to the left a smaller stack of the same paper filled with a masculine scrawl. Nola picked up the top sheet.

  SIMPLE FAITH

  An Operetta

  For the next hour Nola sat on the edge of Harry’s chair and read. The pages laid out the story of a family living on Nantucket and then moving to the city where they faced a life like none they had ever known or could have imagined. It was the story of how that family faced their fears and opened their hearts to what they came to accept as God’s will. It was a play about differences between people. By the final page the members of that family found love and purpose away from the safe surroundings of life on Nantucket by simply remaining true to the traditions and the faith with which they had been raised.

  When Nola reached the last page, the handwritten margin notes trailed off after several lines that had been scratched through. This was Harry’s first attempt at converting the lines to lyrics, she realized.

  She leaned back in his chair, still holding the last page. In so many ways this was her story. She had lived her entire life on Nantucket. As a child she had dreamed the same dreams other children dreamed. She had thought she would go to Boston and study classical music. She had even imagined that one day she would give concerts in recital halls across America—perhaps in Europe.

  But everything had changed for her. She had promised herself that once her siblings were off on their own, there would be time enough for her to…what?

  Follow dreams? Find love?

  Hearing footsteps outside and the muffled voice of Ian calling out to Harry, Nola hastily stacked the pages of the play and placed them on the side of the desk. Then she pulled a clean sheet from the other stack of papers and picked up the pen just as Harry stepped through the door.

  “Well now, this is indeed a surprise, Miss Nola,” he said. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit at an hour I believe you usually reserve for marketing?”

  Nola’s hand shook slightly and a blob of ink splashed onto the paper. She quickly wadded the soiled paper and replaced the pen in its holder, buying the time she needed to steady her nerves now that Starbuck himself was standing before her.

  “I was going to leave you a note,” she said. “Mr. McAllister suggested it. I…”

  “And the note would say?”

  “I was asking you to stop by the tearoom at your earliest convenience.”

  Harry grinned and tossed his hat expertly onto a rung of the hall tree. “My earliest convenience is now, so shall we take a walk back to the tearoom or conduct your business here?”

  “This is fine,” Nola said and she stood up as Harry sat down in the other chair in the room.

  He crossed one ankle over the other as he stretched his long legs out in front of him, then folded his arms over his chest and cocked one eyebrow. “I’m listening.”

  Nola had rehearsed what she would say at least two dozen times and yet now her throat closed and her mouth felt as if it had suddenly been filled with sand. She cleared her throat and looked at him, then away. Part of the problem was that he was sitting with his back to the window. The sun was streaming in and his face was completely in shadow. She moved around the desk and out of the glare of the sun and faced him.

  “Your company of performers may occupy the rooms on my upper floors,” she began. “With several conditions.”

  Starbuck slowly uncrossed his feet and arms and sat taller in the cha
ir, his attention riveted on her. “You do have a way of getting my attention, Nola. Okay, what are your terms?”

  “One, this is a temporary arrangement until I can hire the staffing I need for the tearoom or you can complete repairs on the housing you rented—whichever comes first.”

  “Seems fair. What’s number two?”

  “I will not tolerate raucous behavior, spirits or card playing under my roof.”

  Harry nodded. “Goes without saying. Three?”

  “You will need to arrange whatever rehearsal schedule you have planned around the open hours of my tearoom.” Nola took some pleasure in seeing that she had managed to surprise him once again.

  “And that would be because?” he asked.

  “That would be because in exchange for their room and board your performers will be staffing my tearoom.”

  Starbuck burst out laughing and Nola’s heart sank. She steeled herself for his derision and for his rejection of the entire idea. But to her amazement he stood up and stuck out his hand.

  “You’ve got yourself a deal, Nola.”

  Unsure of what to say in response to that, she placed her hand in his and fought against the awareness that his was twice the size of hers and yet his grasp was gentle but firm. “Very well, then,” she managed. “I’ll ask Mr. Humboldt to draw up an agreement.”

  Starbuck frowned. He was still holding her hand. “Is that really necessary? I mean a gentleman’s—and lady’s—agreement surely…”

  “This is business, Harry,” she replied and withdrew her hand from his, then headed for the door. “If you’ll just let me know when you are expecting the company?”

  “Day after tomorrow,” he replied as he moved around his desk.

  “Then I’ll get in touch with Mr. Humboldt right away. Good day, Harry.”

  She had opened the door and stepped out onto the landing when she heard the rustle of papers followed by his voice.

  “Nola?” He handed her the copy of his play. “So, what did you think of it?”

  “It’s quite good,” she replied primly as she pulled the door closed behind her. It’s going to be brilliant, she thought and as she descended the stairs she could not help but marvel at the many talents God had seen fit to bestow upon Harrison Starbuck.

  Two days later Nola could not seem to control her curiosity. Judy had reported that Starbuck had sent Jonah to the railway station to meet the performers and bring them up the hill to Nola’s place.

  “I would think Mr. Starbuck would meet them himself,” Nola said.

  “Oh, he’ll stop by later, I’m sure, but something came up with the cabaret construction so he’s had to go over there for the time being. Perhaps you should go on down there and greet them,” Judy suggested.

  “I hardly think that appropriate,” Nola replied and yet she seemed incapable of moving away from the bay window of her parlor as the little train chugged into the station. With a swoosh of its brakes, the two open railway cars came to a stop and what she observed next gave her pause.

  The first passengers to appear were a couple of dandies—young men in boater hats, striped jackets and vanilla-colored flannel trousers. They did a little tap dance when Jonah greeted them and ended it with a bow. Next they took positions to either side of the platform and appeared to announce the arrival of three women, each of them flamboyantly garbed. The first was a tall stately woman of indeterminate age. She wore a violet gown fitted to every curve of her full-bodied figure down to her knees where the skirt flared. She wore a ridiculously large plumed hat with a veil and twirled a small lavender parasol over one shoulder.

  The next two women were slim and also tall. Dressed identically in bright green gowns more suited to evening wear than traveling, they seemed to be talking in unison and nonstop. The fabric of their colorful clothing glinted in the sun and while their arms and necks were covered in white lace, the effect was somehow far too dramatic for proper daytime attire. They also wore hats—smaller than the purple monstrosity the first woman wore but every bit as overdone with plumes and tulle.

  Nola sighed. What had she let herself in for?

  She was about to turn away when she caught the shadow of yet another passenger. A petite elegant woman dressed in a fashionable canary-yellow suit with a wide-brimmed straw hat banded in yellow tulle stepped into the sunlight. She was holding a small white dog.

  Fascinated, Nola watched as the woman stepped from the train and started walking down the platform where a porter was unloading several large steamer trunks onto the dray Jonah had hired. The others trailed behind her forming an unlikely little parade of characters. To Nola’s surprise, the woman in yellow stepped up to have a word with Jonah as he pulled the carriage and waited for the actors to climb aboard. She saw Jonah indicate the tearoom at the top of the bluff and then the stairway that was the only way other than the beach road to get there.

  The actress appeared to thank him profusely and then she headed directly for the stairs while her fellow performers paused, appeared to consider the climb and then trailed after her.

  “Well, they’re here,” Nola said to Judy, who had also watched the arrival by pretending to sweep the side porch and steps. “Let’s hope I haven’t made the gravest of errors in judgment,” she murmured.

  As Nola stepped out onto the porch to greet them, Judy joined her, smoothing her hair back and setting her broom aside.

  The woman in yellow was a good ten steps ahead of the others, who appeared to be struggling to catch their breath after the steep climb.

  “Miss Burns? I am Eleanore Chambliss. Harrison tells me you have quite literally rescued our little band from homelessness.” She offered Nola her hand and Nola could not help noticing that the actress’s fawn leather gloves were the finest she had ever seen.

  “This is Mrs. Lang,” Nola said, turning to Judy, who curtsied to the actress.

  “Ah, the chef,” Eleanore said and Judy blushed scarlet. “And this is Sir Lancelot,” she said, introducing the white ball of fur that might have been taken for a muff if the season were different. “Not to worry,” she assured Nola, “he’s quite housebroken and well-behaved. He was born backstage during a matinee.”

  “I hadn’t expected to have…” Nola began but the actress interrupted.

  “Come along, darlings,” she called over her shoulder. “Miss Burns has a business to run here and we are delaying her.”

  “I’ll just show you to your rooms,” Judy offered.

  “Lead on,” Eleanore instructed with a dramatic wave of one hand.

  The rest of the introductions were hastily made as the remainder of the troupe followed Eleanore through the doors and up the main stairway. “Of course, we shall use the back stairs when we are working,” Nola heard Eleanore instruct the others.

  “There was no mention of a dog,” she muttered, wondering what else Starbuck might have failed to tell her. “Interviews will begin promptly at eleven,” she called up the stairs. “And I assume you will wish to change.”

  “Your traveling attire simply will not do for serving here at Miss Nola’s,” she heard Judy explain.

  Just half an hour later Nola was pleased to see all six members of the group seated on the twin tufted benches that lined the foyer between her parlor and the tearoom. They had all changed into clothing that, while still a bit colorful for her taste, was at least more subdued than the garb they had arrived in.

  “Very well,” she said, “shall we begin with the gentlemen?”

  The two young men leaped to their feet and smiled at her with confidence. “Jasper March,” the one announced.

  “William Andrews,” chimed in the second, “but everyone calls me Billy.”

  Nola glanced at their hands—smooth as the inside of an oyster shell. She sighed. “Have you gentlemen ever washed dishes?” she asked as she waited for them to precede her into the parlor and then shut the doors.

  The interviews went far better than Nola might have expected. Jasper and Billy assured her that k
itchen duty was just fine with them. In fact, they relished the opportunity to work with Mrs. Lang and learn from her. “After all, Billy here will be pulling double duty cooking for the rest of us once we get settled into our real digs,” Jasper informed her. “See, he’s new and as the new guy he gets the bottom-of-the-barrel assignments—and parts.” He chuckled and nudged Billy with his elbow. “Not that I’m saying working in your kitchen is bottom of the barrel or anything,” he hastened to add.

  “Stop talking now,” Billy muttered under his breath and Nola repressed a smile.

  “We’ll see how things go,” she said, ushering them to the door. “Please go see Mrs. Lang and ask her for further directions. Next,” she called and the two identically dressed females stood up. They were girls really, surely no more than eighteen, if that.

  “Deedee and Mimi Kowalski, ma’am,” they chorused.

  A bit nonplussed that the two of them not only dressed alike but seemed to speak in unison as well, Nola turned to the third woman—still wearing purple although now it was a plainer skirt and blouse ensemble. Nevertheless it was still fitted to show off her large chest, tiny waist and curvaceous hips. Her face was heavily made up in what Nola realized was an attempt to hide her true age. “And you are?”

  “Olga Romanoff—Countess Olga Romanoff,” the woman intoned in a deep throaty accented voice as she brushed past Nola and entered the parlor.

  Nola saw Eleanore roll her eyes and heard Sir Lancelot give a low growl as the countess passed.

  The Kowalski twins were eager to please and seemed to look upon this entire business as some grand adventure. The Romanoff woman, on the other hand, appeared bored and dismissive and Nola was trying hard to decide how best to handle her when the interview was interrupted by a loud shriek and repeated yaps from the dog outside the door.

  “What on earth?” Nola muttered as she got up from her desk and slid open the pocket doors. The sight that greeted her explained a lot.

  Harrison Starbuck and Eleanore were clasping hands, laughing and talking over each other while the dog danced excitedly at their feet.